LidoLiz

Great photos! Love those old-timey Promenade deck strolls, especially when it’s quiet.

This whole thread has me hankering for a quiet afternoon stroll/book on a wraparound Grand-class Promenade deck….isn’t it great that there are still ships for all cruisers!

We were there in Nov. 2022 and it turned out to be a great port stop. Yes, a shuttle bus to Soulac was provided at a reasonable rate by Princess (although not announced in advance). We had a great blue-sky day touring the pretty town, strolling the clean wide beaches, and enjoying an outdoor cafe with fresh mussels, frites and local wines. I hope you enjoy a similarly wonderful day! It’s definitely not the “back end of nowhere”.

This was the Buddha Bowl on the Ruby last month…it was quite tasty, despite its appearance. Did yours look much different?

It was a main!

My recent vegan dishes on Ruby Princess were hit and miss. The area for most improvement was presentation. I also noticed that the tomato-based dishes all really tasted the same, so I’m guessing they used the same recipe for the sauces. The tastiest dish was the soy maple portobello mushrooms… The worst dish, by taste, was the mushroom bourguignon..the mushrooms were under there somewhere, smothered in tomato sauce…. The walnut fettuccine turned out to be penne… …and tasted a lot like the Pasta alla Norma… The farfalle with tomatoes rang a bell… The Buddha bowl with sweet potato was excellent…. ….and the Baja cauliflower taco that was advertised as a “starter” dish filled the entire plate, but it was very good. On our two-week cruise, the vegan menu was repeated twice, so I just started ordering the vegetarian dishes off the main menu on the second week, These dishes were much better, including presentation, but it’s still early in the vegan menu rollout so patience is warranted.

We were on the Ruby two weeks ago, and the pub lunch was delicious. I miss the event being held in the Wheelhouse, but the MDR servers did a great job. The fish was crisp!

That was the easiest disembarkation that we’ve ever experienced! We walked off at 8:15 a.m after a leisurely breakfast at the buffet. Deck 5 had no exit lineup but it appeared they were using Deck 6 for the larger timed groups. Despite having an assigned 8:45 am departure bag tag, our luggage was already waiting for us in the terminal by 8:15, and there were several agents to point you to the right section. The facial recognition technology in the terminal sure speeds things up! The only snag was the long lineups for transfer buses outside the terminal…if you simply wanted a taxi to the airport, you had to muscle your way through the folks waiting for their bus. A bit chaotic. Otherwise, it was very easy to disembark and get a taxi, and we were inside the FLL airport by 8:45 a.m.

Last full day afloat…..we are now busy packing and preparing our tip envelopes for our excellent steward and Botticelli servers… Our final lunch in DaVinci offered quite a few choices…. We opted for the calamari, the Thai shrimp spring roll and the rice paper summer roll. Our lovely Thai server spent some time explaining his own homemade peanut satay recipe. I wish he had been cooking today, as our sauce was bland and and grainy…

A quiet morning around the ship, with generally smooth seas. For those who are about to take the next cruise: I have seen very little evidence of Covid…. haven’t seen a single little table out in the hallways (in the past, this indicated someone is in quarantine) and no excessive coughing, etc. There are still a few people wearing masks, but not many. People are washing their hands at the new sinks outside the buffet. So all good news, however others on this cruise may wish to add their own observations…

Medical call for an ambulance to the ship means we are leaving port about an hour late….hope all is well with the passenger who is being disembarked.

Back in our cabin cooling off after several hours at Eagle Beach. Current bridge cam view… Current view off our starboard balcony, which is cooking right now…. We went to the Passions beach bar on Eagle Beach, and had a great morning. Loungers and palapas were $15 pp, and the beer buckets were cold. The water and sand were amazing. It was easy to take the public bus to the beach at $2.50 pp. On the way home, a local bus/van stopped at the bus stop where we were waiting, and charged us just two bucks each for a drive right to the port gate.

I love these new chair cushions in the Wheelhouse Bar.

Italian night tonight in the MDR, with the twinkling lights of Willemstad off our port side. With Limoncello. Eggplant Parmigiana Scallops and shrimp, photo is upside down for some reason. I blame the Limoncello. Elixir of the gods. With a complimentary shot glass. Goodbye, Curacao!

Lovely breezy afternoon in Curacao…and a visit to our favourite gelato joint. It’s a long port stop here, with a 10 pm departure before we head to Aruba.

We saw a few of these species, including finches and some Trupial nests.

We spent the morning taking a guided tour of the Rif Mangrove park, which is just across the street from the cruise pier. Great value ($20) for those interested in birds, the coastal environment, and the history of this reclaimed area. Or you can walk through by yourself for $15, and there are lots of interpretive signs. Most of the park is accessible by wheelchair on well-maintained walkways through the mangroves. We saw lots of swooping parakeets, herons and even a baby barracuda.

Sorry, I meant Skywalkers, not Sabatini’s!! (Evidently food on the brain).

I have taken my book to both…..I like Sabatini’s better because of the expansive ocean views on three sides. And Adagio’s has actually been a bit too chilly!

Excellent pub lunch today in Da Vinci on Deck 6. It wasn’t advertised in the Patter, but the menu was posted outside the dining room and it was also listed in the app under the Da Vinci dining section. The fish was perfectly crisped and the mushy peas were, well, mushy! The portion sizes were good for a light lunch, although the couple next to us requested more fish. The servers came around and dished out dollops of malt vinegar and ketchup if requested. (We were too full for the dessert, but it looked good.)

I ❤️ sea days…. at the Lotus pool… and I wonder how effective these will be…

The Lotus pool has been lovely and quiet in the morning and a respite from the louder pool areas. We have also really been enjoying Sabatini’s during the afternoons for peaceful book reading.

The local dignitaries in Port of Spain, including the mayor and head of Tourism Trinidad, just held a formal welcoming ceremony dockside to mark the first cruise ship of the 2023-24 season. It was announced that there will be 41 cruise stops here between now and April 17, including the Ruby, Emerald and Island Princess. Altogether, they said, this season will represent a 51% increase in cruise ship tourism to Port of Spain, and they singled out Princess for being the one cruise line that has always returned to, and supported, this port. Seems to be a good number of cruisers who are getting off and entering the dockside shops, but it’s hard to see how many are actually venturing beyond the gates into the city, given the U.S. government advisories/warnings that are still in place.

Headed over to Grand Anse beach in Grenada this morning for a gorgeous five hours in the sun. It was $10 round trip for the water taxi right near the cruise dock, and a ten-minute ride to the beach. There were plenty of loungers as it’s a long beach. We paid $15 each for a chair and umbrella, but those arriving after us were charged $10 (they must have seen us coming 😀). The service was good (esp. the cold buckets of Carib beer).

Tonight’s vegan menu in Botticelli… Short review….the tofu was all right, but skip the flavourless mushroom bourguignon - it was served in a tomato sauce strangely reminiscent of last night’s pasta sauce. But with something like mashed potatoes on top….