kathleen21

Sunday street market-

We walked around following the old walls. The lighting was beautiful!

The front desk clerk told us about a street fair that was happening tonight, so a couple of hours later we followed his directions and walked to the fair. So much fun! The streets were cordoned off from cars and there were lights strung across the road. Bands were playing at the street corners. Restaurants had special menus and tables set up outside.

We had some local street food, did a little shopping at the artists tables that were set up in the plaza, and I even danced along in a spontaneous line dance. A fun evening in Old Town San Juan!

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A couple of hours later we were refreshed. Catedral Metropolitana Basílica de San Juan Bautista church was open, so we went in and did a self-tour. Beautiful church, and we were able to use Google translate to read the plaques on the monuments. It's the second oldest church in the Americas, and Ponce de Leon is buried here.

Phone translation app-

We then walked around and explored the neighborhood, found a cute place for a lunch/snack thanks to Yelp, and shopped at the local grocery store. Then back to the room for A/C. Have I mentioned yet how hot and humid it was?!

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A nicely done review! Really enjoyed your awesome photos!

Than you! I will give my husband a bit of credit too[emoji12]

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Sunday –

We were a table of four for breakfast. The dining room staff was kind about finding a convenient space to park our luggage while we ate. They were a little distracted at breakfast, but overall it was a satisfying last meal on board. Why don’t I eat smoked salmon for breakfast at home?!

We all met up with our luggage in the main lobby and this is where it got a little dicey. Three of the four main elevators were on manual override, with staff using them to transport people down to the exit. The glass elevators in the lobby were jammed. We waited 5-10 minutes for an elevator, and were almost ready to commit to making trips down the stairs, when we finally caught an elevator. Whew! After that it was easy. One last scan of your Sail n sign card and you were off! Here’s a tip – don’t try to leave if you haven’t settled your account. Seriously. We saw 3 people turned back and made to go to the (long) line at guest services. We had put all our rooms on a credit card, and easily followed the bill with the Hub app, so there were no surprises for us. Immigration was fast and easy, and we were soon in the sunshine.

Hubby and I were staying in San Juan until Wednesday, but the kids were all flying out that day. We figured they had to head to the airport at 1130. So we got a taxi to our hotel in Old Town, left all the luggage in a corner of their main lobby, and by 9am were all headed out for one last adventure. Old San Juan is pretty quiet at 9am on a Sunday morning. We ended up looking on Yelp for restaurant and walked to a place serving mimosas from a rooftop café with a view of the city.

This led to discussion of those delicious Pina Coladas some of had at Barrachinas before the cruise. It was 1030, and even though their website said Barrachinas didn’t open until 11, we decided to walk over there and get one last Pina Colada for the road.

They were so nice there. Letting us in early, and even making a plate of off the menu nachos for the kids to share. Full and happy, we headed back to our hotel, met the taxi, kissed the kids good bye… and went to check in to the hotel. Our room was ready so they gave us an early check in. Hotel Herencia, which I booked online after looking at reviews on hotels dot com.

We loved this place! It was beautifully decorated, centrally located, and best of all had great air conditioning! It was so nice to relax and cool off in the room in between walking everywhere. It seemed no matter where we went, we could be back in our room (and that fabulous A/C!) in 10 minutes.

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Saturday, our last night ☹️

After getting back on board we ordered some room service appetizers and started packing up. It’s amazing how much stuff you can accumulate in a week! We ordered a cold bottle of white wine and relaxed over dinner, wandered the ship to explore one last time, went to more comedy shows, and just enjoyed the night. Random ship shots-

We all had carry off luggage and later flights the next day, so we weren’t really concerned about the debarkation process. We agreed to meet at 0800 for those that wanted one last dining room breakfast.

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Next up, Maho beach. D#3 is a pilot and aviation major, so this was a high point of the cruise for her! Our timing was good, since D#1 and BF had

Been there long enough to get us a table at the closest plane watching restaurant. You are definitely paying for the convenience. The food was ok, burgers and bar food, but the service was slow and lacking. We should have packed sandwiches and just gone to the beach. Or skipped lunch. My opinion. Everyone else liked the food and island drinks though.

We got to stay here a couple hours, then stayed on the tour for the ride to explore the Dutch city before walking back to the ship.

Found the yoga guy museum. That was a fun half hour for hubby and I.

We shopped and explored the town.

The walk back to the ship was easy and safe enough, just hot. About 20 minutes actually. We had one last frozen drink on St Martin and headed onboard for our last night.

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It was a very, very interesting tour. When he talked about living on an island where really the only way to earn it living is tourism it made me reconsider those hustlers in Barbados. Maybe they were just hard working guys trying to support a family …

We crossed the border to the French side and had the opportunity for a bit of shopping. Bought some French pastries to eat at the beach too.

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Anyway, because we were the only ones on the tour, he was open about changing it around some. We opted to skip Orient Beach in order to spend more time at Maho Beach. Perfect solution.

The iguana farm has been closed for years it seems. We were better off, since a clever entrepreneur has made his own attraction at the roadside.

He gave you lettuce on a stick to hold and feed the iguanas. If you wanted to tip him, a jar was available. No pressure, and pretty fun.

I

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Saturday – St Martin/St Maarten

Today we planned ahead to split up. D#1 and BF were going to sleep in and spend the day plane watching at Maho beach. The rest of us wanted to see the more of the island, so we booked SXM Island tour #2 with Bernard’s Tours. That would take us to both sides of the island with the airplane beach as the last stop. We figured if any other daughter wanted to stay there longer they could share the taxi back to the ship with their sister.

From the website, the tour 9-2:30pm and $45pp, would include:

"Pickup at the cruise pier

Iguana Farm ( currently under construction until further notice)

Stop at the French and Dutch border [2 mins]

Brief stop at Oyster Pond over looking the island of St Barths [5-10 mins]

Orient Beach where you'll be able to swim and have lunch [90-120 mins]

Marigot - open market (French Capital) [30 mins]

Maho Beach - see low flying planes [45 mins]

Drive through Simpson Bay marina

Harold Jack Hill (View of Simpson Marina,Airport & Anguilla)

Return to Philipsburg depends on tour departure time; all guests will be returned in time to meet their ship's sail time.

Upon return to Philipsburg, transfer back to the ship will be provided free of charge, or you may choose to remain in Philipsburg to shop or sightsee at your own leisure. Walking back to the ship takes between 12 and 15 minutes, or a taxi may take you for $3."

So breakfast this morning gave us the opportunity to eat from the buffet and sit outside with island breezes. That is one part about eating in the dining room that I missed. The buffet food was fine. There were actually a few items that weren’t available in the dining room, like meat and cheese trays, that I really enjoyed having. I missed my salmon though. Bought a coffee ($3 ish) for the road and left early (for us[emoji12])

We were supposed to meet our guide at 8:30 am, so we needed to get moving! They had sent directions in an email to follow to the meeting point that was just outside the port shopping area. After checking in we discovered that we had a private tour! Our guide (I’m terrible with names) was a 65 year old retired gentleman, a friend of Bernard, who led tours for fun a few days a month. We were so lucky to have him. He not only pointed out the sights, but told us the history and current social and economic ramifications.

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Great review. Thinking about taking this cruise as our 10th anniversary cruise next June. I love reading Southern Caribbean reviews.

Book it! :D

Nicely done. Thank You !!! taking the sailing in Sept what a help this was.

Matt

You're welcome! You will have a great time.

Hi there, great review so far! I heard somewhere that on most nights, there are "steakhouse" choices at the Dining Rooms for an extra $20, but on formal nights you can get lobster and other steakhouse items free of charge. Can you please confirm this for me? I will be doing this cruise in January and I'm super excited about all the food :D

The menu on the formal nights is different than the every night menus. On regular nights there is always the steak house $20 items, and a flat iron steak free choice. That one my husband loved actually. On formal nights the menu was changed, and had less choices. Lobster was only available on the first formal night, along with one nice steak choice. I don't remember seeing the rest of the steakhouse available on Formal night.

I wouldn't take a risk on that. You'd need to be at the airport a minimum of 2 hours (more likely 3 for a long-haul flight) beforehand. That's somewhere between 11.15am - 12.15pm. It's a couple of hours from Genoa to Milan - that's not port to airport, either.

Thank you all for your help! I read here about someone easily flying home to Gatwick. So I did a search and that is a reasonably priced flight also. So we will be on th BA flight at noon to Gatwick, stay overnight, and catch an afternoon flight home the next day.

Coming attractions!

Once we were back on board we went up to Waterworks and the water slide, playing in the water toys and enjoying the beauty as we sailed away.

We relaxed with new friends by the pool and went to the Serenity deck to warm up in the hot tubs. Then it was time to get ready for dinner. Picture of the chocolate buffet from one of the days afternoon snack times-

Dinner was fun and delicious as usual. I can't believe people complain about the food on this ship! Chris, one of our favorite waiters-

Carnival had brought on new comics so we split up to wander around the ship and met in the theater for the show. This guy was ok. Too much repetition of the jokes about small cabins and toilet humor. Come on people, we have heard that already! But he did make me laugh a few times at least. Overall, we liked the idea of the Comedy theater much better than the Playlist production shows. Personal preference for sure. Hubby and I decided to wander around and enjoy the waves and some quiet areas on the deck, while the kids stayed for the second show ( and another new comedian.) A late night cup of decaf and a little snack and it was time for bed.

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I wish I knew the name of this beach... anyone? It's to the right as you leave the dock, maybe 15-20 minutes from the ship.

Anyway, it was a lovely beach with a nice restaurant and pretty bathroom facilities. We took our shoes off and took took fun pictures in the water.

This time we waited for other people on the bus, entertaining ourselves by dancing around in the parking lot to the party music our guide had playing on the bus. No more rum punch this time though.

Eventually everyone arrived and we went back to the port, the guide speaking over the loudspeaker about how much he loved us and loved spending time with us. Sure. Whatever. But I am glad we did it. For one thing we found out that if we come back here again we will spend more time at the Batik factory, tour the fort and then go to that beach. Plus that rain storm was just so much fun!

By this time it was about 2:30 and the kids were hungry. Even though the ship was literally a 10 minute walk away they wanted to eat local food. We settled on an open air bar and restaurant that served a variety of items. We ended up with a plate of nachos ("island food"?!) and some great Indian food. My daughters asking about gluten free cooking resulted in a very interesting conversation with the chef about "real" Indian food, cashew curry, and the difference in cooking in America vs India. Hubby was not that interested in any of this food and saved himself for the lunch buffet on the ship. He headed there after we were done, while the rest of us did some more shopping.

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We ended up holding up the bus, since it took us about 20 minutes to speed through the Factory, listen to a brief explanation of batik and buy some souvenir batik bags with mini bottles of local rum as souvenirs.

Our guide was a little grouchy when we got back, but re-opened the cooler and poured us drinks after I asked. We loaded up and headed back toward and past the ship to the other side of the island. Along the way it started to pour rain. Literally out of nowhere, the heavens opened up and we were in a downpour. This must happen frequently since the driver casually pulled over and instructed us as to how to roll down the plastic sides to the bus. Of course, that did nothing to stop the rain from rolling down the roof and onto us!

But 10 minutes later the rain had stopped and he pulled over and rolled the plastic sides back up. We were dry with the sunshine and breeze in just a few minutes.

We stopped briefly for the classic picture of the Atlantic Ocean/Caribbean sea, then went to a beach for another 15 minute break.

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We headed through some towns and jungle, past the Brimstone Fortress and stopped at the Batik factory. He told us we had 15 minutes to make a quick tour if we wanted. D#1, BF and I ran for the Batik entrance, while everyone else enjoyed the rum punch and looked around at the gardens.

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Friday - St Kitts

We had decided to sleep in a bit and meet to be off the ship by 10am to see what St Kitts would have to offer. Didn't plan anything ahead of time. We just couldn't estimate how we would feel, if we would be too tired or what. Of course I ended up waking early, but I had a chance to run a few miles and take some pretty docking pictures.

We walked off he ship easily. This was one of the only times there was another ship in port at the same time, so there was more action on the dock than we were used to. St Kitts has a large open air shopping mall kind of complex with a few restaurants and bars mixed in.

We were walking around shopping when Hubby was approached by a tour operator. They started talking, and next thing you know we were all agreeing to an island tour. So much for having a day with no planned activities! I was happy about this for two reasons - the sugestion to tour and choice of operator didn't come from me, and I had been feeling bad about judging Barbados based on the little we had experienced on our own. Hubby arranged that we would be part of a tour of about 20 people, 2.5 hours, for $20 each. So we loaded up and took off in the open air bus. The music was kind of loud, and the speaker system was kind of muffled, but if I listened closely I could understand the guides descriptions.

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Thank you for the review.

We will be on this cruise in March 2018.

I appreciate your review of your tour in St. Lucia. Most reviews are of Spencer's tours.

We were all very happy with Joys tours. They were very responsive by email too.

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Hub app is $5 per device for the entire cruise. So for us, it is $5 vs $35 and just not worth the extra $30. I admit, I don't use facebook though.

I also liked that the Hub app works only in airplane mode, so the fear of accidental roaming charges wasn't there. On the Fascination in May we didn't experience having to manually reconnect when getting back on board. It did it as soon as we went into airplane mode.

Great job on the review! We were on this itinerary last Spring (2016) and will be hitting a few of the same islands NEXT Spring. The beach you went to in Barbados looks like it was the Boatyard? My wife and I are thinking of doing that this time around. I have been back and forth about walking vs taxi. It looks like the walk is pretty easy? The vision I had was just along a lonely road to the beach but from you pics it looks like it is more on a sidewalk through town/stores etc?

 

Looking forward to the rest of your review! Reliving our cruise through you!

Thanks! It was the Boatyard, yes. A nice, calm beach with plenty of activities available to buy if you choose.

We all liked the walk. It was nice to stretch our legs a bit. Getting through the determined taxi drivers was the worst part. It wasn't longer than a mile to the town, all sidewalk and safe, and the ocean was nice to look at while walking. The hardest part is the last 10 minutes from town, when you are on the sand and looking at the cool water you want to jump in!

Thank you. I knew that I would have to go to guest services as soon as I got on the ship to try and get a spot b/c space is limited...told my hubs that is the first thing I am doing when we board. I am glad to hear that it is less than I thought...about 30.00 less for the 2 of us.

I was hoping to get some pictures for you, but BF says cameras and phones weren't allowed. He got a couple of Carnival souvenirs, including a baseball cap. Also, they each got a photograph with the Captain.

I noticed that the cost you listed for your BF's Behind the Scenes tour was 55.00. My son (14) are really wanting to do this when we sail on the Fascination in October and I had read the price was 75.00...is it lower on the Fascination or are there 2 different tours..one being 55.00 and one being 75.00. I would love know.

I just double checked with him. He says it was $60, went from about 9-noon, and he highly recommends it! He signed up onboard the day before. I don't know if it is something you can book ahead of time.

Great review so far! I'm looking forward to the rest of it! We're doing this same cruise in September :)

September?! That's next month! Lucky you:D

Dinner that night was the second formal night, but it was definitely less formal than the first one. People looked nice, but there were fewer gowns and tuxes. We were smarter this time and got our pager before we spent time taking pictures. No lobster tonight, but plenty of food and drink to keep us all very satisfied.

After dinner we changed into comfy clothes and met in the buffet dining area to play Cards Against Humanity. It was nice to spend some down time together and make our own entertainment for a change. Of course, after a couple of hours someone had to try the Pizza… Then it was off to bed and a bit of a sleep in.

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