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Harry, thanks for sticking it out until the very end. I know it has to be time consuming and tough to stay determined and finish out the report when you have everyday life and other priorities getting in the way. I think your trip reports are unique not only on CC, but on any travel site out there! You take people through the entire vacation process, not only the cruise. So that by the time somebody goes on a cruise on the same ship you went on, they will know almost every single thing they need to, and how to save money. If you could get some more publicity, you could probably start to market the Cheapo series...

It was pretty cool being on the same cruise as you guys not only because we got to meet but leaving the cruise I knew that I would be reading another Cheapo Dad report with so much detail, but would be able to relate to everything you talk about. Thanks, and good luck on your next trip in the future!

Hey, Brandon,

 

Yeah, it’s time to wrap it up by this weekend if nothing weird happens to my schedule. It’s always hard to tell when you can find time to post.

 

We like WJ as we have varied food tastes so buffet is the best place to provide that and you can see from my lunch preferences that I eat a little of everything and not just one plate of fish or a burger. I rather have chicken/lamb/beef/fish with rice and noodles and whatever else.

 

We haven’t been on the Freedom for over a year so I don’t know if my perception of her is still valid as things are always changing. But for most part, the ship is similar in size, with Freedom having more people as they packed in more cabins in their last dry dock. Indy will likely be the same by this summer after her dry dock.

 

I mentioned that the vibe of Freedom seems more “intense” in them constantly trying to sell you drinks packages or specialty dining. There was always a band singer or loud music at RP during middle of the afternoon blasting music as you try to shop. Indy is much more laid back.

 

But as others have said, Indy’s shopping sucks.

 

Overall, these are small differences. The “hardware” is pretty much the same with some slight variation of stores. It’ll be the software/people/vibe that will be different but not sure if that impacts you if you are off the ship a lot on the port calls.

Thanks for the info. If all goes to plan, by the time we take our next cruise, we would like to try either one of the Oasis ships or a new cruise line, definitely something bigger. Not that IOS is small or we weren't impressed with RCL, we just like to try new experiences.

I know you said you guys were doing DW this December- we had annual passes a couple years ago so I know lots has changed since we've been there, but the planning today is super important, perfect for planners like you;);). Make sure you get the really popular fastpasses at the 60-day mark, it helps a lot. I'm hoping to get back there sometime in the next year or two.

So sad to be coming to the end of the trip report, Harry:(

Interesting, you guys seemed to visit WJ quite a lot for lunch throughout the cruise. We had a different pattern, had breakfast there the first few mornings and a few lunches, but then we tried the MDR for breakfast about halfway thru the cruise and were more impressed with the food, especially the eggs since they were cooked to order. As for lunch we always found ourselves running around in the middle of the day so it seemed like we got something quick from Cafe Promenade/Sorrentos most days and WJ when we had more time, but we did do WJ for dinner the night we left St. Kitts.

I did want to ask, now that we are at the end, how would you compare this and your Freedom cruise? Besides the fact that it was longer, any bias or differences between the ships since they are almost identical (besides half-filled juices haha)? And which itinerary (islands) did you like better? Just because you go so in-depth, I am sure there are more differences you can point out than most people.

Is it a gentle slope or steep drop to get in and out?

It was a small drop once you get about 3 or 4 feet into the water. Definitely shuffle your feet as the water does not have good clarity so you cannot see the drop down. Wow, lots of talk about these sand fleas- I have been fortunate to never encounter them but they sound terrible!

Hi Harry, happy Chinese New Year. Was just able to catch up on your day 7 pictures now, as it has been madness here with the recent school shooting, which happened just down the road from our house at the high school here. Just a crazy situation here. But fortunately, everyone we know, including my brother, is okay.

Regarding St. Kitts, it's interesting because we also went with Grey but somehow we ended up on a different type of tour. Originally we requested to do the tour you did, only with the rainforest hike and Black Rocks on the Atlantic side as well. When we got there, however, we discovered it was a private tour with just us, which was pretty nice! Our driver was great as well. Brimstone Fort was our favorite stop of the cruise. Looking forward to the sea days ahead!

Harry, those photos are INCREDIBLE. They literally look like they were taken out of a movie. We've been wanting to go out to Utah/Arizona forever but is a long way from South FL and we often don't want to have to fly/rent a car so we do many trips to the Smoky Mtns. and such. But we'll definitely be doing the western trip in the near future. Now we at least have reference points on where to go. Have you been to Yosemite?

Hi, we visited the end of December, the second RC ship to come back after the hurricane. We too were concerned about the damage so we opted to go on a boat tour with Billy bones. I will attach a couple pictures. Also be sure to check out Cheapo Dad's trip report in the Royal Caribbean forum, he visited on the same cruise and has tons of helpful info.

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Did the taxi driver wait for you guys to take you back to the ship? That’s always my fear on going to the beach in the afternoon on getting back to the ship on time. But at Antigua we had a later departure time so it helps (all aboard is 5:30 and in winter time, the sun sets earlier so I would imagine the beach would start to clear after 4 PM).

 

St. Kitts had an all aboard at 4:30 so that would be a more risky move to stay out later.

If I remember correctly we got there around 2 and asked him to come back around 3:30, but I think he came closer to 4. The later departure did give us plenty of time. One thing I notice is we did not get to catch any of the nighttime sailaways as we were always busy doing stuff on the ship, except for that temporary return to St. Kitts. Your nighttime pictures are so pretty.

Hi, Brandon,

 

Guess that dog must be a fixture at the beach looking for whatever leftover food people toss at the beach.

 

So who recommended this beach to you guys? Did you research this on your own or heard from word of mouth?

 

We went to the beach at 4 of the 5 ports. I would say this one was the prettiest of all the ones we saw. I could do without the crowd but then you know people tend to flock to the nicer beaches. Next time we go to Antigua, I would opt for a smaller beach like Turners or some lesser known places.

Our original plan was to go on a tour that included stingray city and valley church beach. However, we found it was cheaper to do stingray city through the ship and go to a beach on our own, and left us more time to visit the uncle in prison haha. On the way, the driver recommended Jolly Beach more as he said valley church was smaller and more crowded, so we took his word for it. I do agree about going to a smaller/quieter beach, since there are so many on that island.

Harry, how funny that we got to that beach literally an hour or so after you! We even saw that dog in your photo. We opted to take a cab from the cruise port after stingray city. We also thought jolly beach was beautiful, especially the water and sand (we are very choosy about beaches since we live in FL with so many). So far your tour looks awesome, Antigua was probably our second favorite island after St. Kitts. Thanks for the awesome report so far!

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Thank you.

 

I read yesterday about someone who experienced terrible sand fly bites at one of Antigua's beaches.

Did you notice any sand flies?

 

Were there clean bathrooms available?

 

Thanks again

 

Beautiful photos by the way!

Thanks for the compliments on the photos. No sand flies, in fact I have never encountered sand flies so I don't have a great idea of what they look like but no pests. We did not use the bathroom as we were only there for 2.5 hours but there was a bar and what looked like a beach resort farther behind us (large building) so I assume they would have clean bathrooms.

Hi, we have never been to Dickenson bay but we took a taxi to Jolly Beach the day after Christmas. $50 round trip for 4 people. Our original plan was to go to Valley Church but our driver said that beach was a bit over crowded so he took us to Jolly Beach. We thought the water was so blue and beautiful (sunny weather probably helped) and the waves were super calm. We were able to rent two chairs and an umbrella for $10. Also, I wanted to add that we tried walking down to the bus station to save in cab fare but ended up going with the taxi because we did not feel it was the safest area once you exit the tourist part of the cruise port and we didn't see any other cruise passengers there. These are our pictures. <br />

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Still here following along! We did the walk up to the El Morro fort but did not see the first one. We thought the fort was awesome but what we loved possibly even more was walking up and down the colorful, Spanish colonial streets. Some of the street corners are so photogenic, not something you would normally see anywhere back in the continental U.S.. It was interesting because compared to some of the other port stops, OSJ seemed busy and bustling, but not necessarily in a tourism kind of way. I am especially looking forward to your St. Maarten pics because we went on a speedboat tour, but I am curious how the devastation looked from a land perspective. Thanks!

We took a taxi to Jolly Beach the day after Christmas. Our original plan was to go to Valley Church but our driver said that beach was a bit over crowded so he took us to Jolly Beach. We thought the water was so blue and beautiful (sunny weather probably helped) and the waves were super calm. We were able to rent two chairs and an umbrella for $10.

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Here are some more :

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Harry, your pictures are just awesome. I just realized that was my brother who took the pictures of you guys on the helipad on day 1 haha- what a coincidence. He is the photographer in the family who we rely on for all our vacation photos so I can't take any credit, but here are some of his better ones:

Great job so far on the report. I look forward to reading the rest of it!

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Hi Harry, looking forward very much to reading this TR. As you know I was on this sailing as well and it was great meeting you and your family. Thanks for filling us in on your experience.

Brandon

For those that booked a boat tour in the near future, do you know where the lunch will be provided, since the restaurants in Grand Case and most on the French side look to be in very bad shape? I doubt they will be operational anytime soon from what I've seen and read. It also looks like the restaurant on Pinel Island suffered heavy damage.

Hi, Javin wasn't available so we ended up booking a similar tour with Grey's island tours.:)

It is very easy to arrange a custom tour at the port. There are many tour operators there that will be able to help you create a tour. You may want to get a few others that are willing to join you to lower the cost. They will negotiate the price depending on the size of the group. There is an entrance fee for Brimstone Hill. It is $10 US.

Hi, I am aware that there are many drivers/tour guides waiting when you arrive at the port, however I would much prefer to have plans in advance. I was looking at both Captain Sunshine tours and Javin's, perhpas they could arrange this kind of tour?

Thanks for the replies. We will be taking the bus service to either Jolly or Valley Church around 12, do you think we will have any issue getting a bus or taxi back to port? I am a bit concerned that many vans/taxis will be full or busy around the return time (4:30 pm).

Looking for a tour that combines Brimstone fort and a rainforest hike, and preferably black rocks as well. I can only seem to find tours that visit Romney Manor but do not include a hike in the rainforest. Would I be best off arranging a custom tour? Thanks.

Hi I would be very grateful if anyone can respond soon...I'd really like to hear some input on this.

Hi, I recently posted on this board a few weeks ago. We are in the process of planning our day in Antigua the end of December and definitely want to do stingray city in the morning and then a beach. Two of the best beaches people talk about are Long Bay beach and Valley Church/Jolly Beach. I realize they are on opposite ends of the island, but if possible I would really like to hear people's opinions of them, and which is recommended more for a family of four. I have narrowed it down to these two beaches. I would really appreciate any input as soon as possible. Thanks!

Hi, does anyone know if Billy Bones is still operating after Irma? It looks like many of the boat tour companies sustained heavy damage. Is anyone booked with them for an upcoming cruise? We will be in St. Martin on Christmas Day. Thanks.