Dave’s Live from Ryndam Southern Caribbean Feb 16 – March 2, 2014

[RetiredMustang]

Feb. 25, Willemstad, Curacao (cont.)

The tour continued over the Queen Juliana Bridge, from where I took a photo of Ryndam in the harbor:

A short drive later was the Curacao factory. It was a small place, and the packing process was equally small-scale. First, the automatic filler filled 8 small bottles at a time (they were bottling the chocolate variety while we were there):

Then, workers topped off the bottles and put on caps, which were crimped and sealed:

The bottles then went a little further down the assembly line to be boxed:

We passed next to another building to have samples of the liqueur:

And, coincidentally, we had an opportunity to buy the finished products:

This was a very nice excursion, with some history, natural history, and booze. Well worth the price in our opinion.

More later,

Dave

[SJSULIBRARIAN]

I realize that scale may be a little hard to tell with a photo (aside from the fact that the plate size tells you it is not a two-pound steak, or a two-ounce one either). The dish actually was a steak of about 4-6 ounces, and two grilled prawns, about the size of the shrimp they serve in the shrimp cocktail -- large as shrimp go, but not huge. There was no lobster.

 

Dave

 

If I recall correctly on the Amsterdam in December, one night there was lobster (alone by itself) , one night there was surf and turf with the surf being 2 medium shrimp, and one night there was lobster thermidor.

[catl331]

What nerve! I was wrong as I thought it was about time for DUCK!!

 

They let you bring the curaco back on the ship??

 

That surf and turf would've been fine for me but they needed a little more filler on the plate to accent it!! I now they tried with the carrots. Gotta watch that Rudi! One cruise carrots were on every entrée. Must of had a big sale!

[RetiredMustang]

...

 

They let you bring the curaco back on the ship??

 

...

 

I just wrote that we had the opportunity to buy ... not that we did. :D We didn't buy any, but a few of our fellow passengers did. That reminds me to tell you about the situation at the gangplank coming aboard. They have what they call the alcohol check station. People who come aboard with alcohol are sent over to that table. We have not hung around to watch or done it ourselves, so I can't speak from personal experience, but we presume that is where the bottle of, say, blue curacao is taken and stowed to be returned on the last night to carry ashore. We also presume that is where you get your wine either stowed for last day, or stickered and you pay the $18 corkage fee.

 

Dave

[Mtn2Sea]

When we were in Curaçao in December, we purchased a small bottle of chocolate liqueur to put on vanilla ice cream. Since it's already half gone, we intend to buy a bottle (or two) when we return to Curaçao next week.

[RuthC]

The dish actually was a steak of about 4-6 ounces, and two grilled prawns, about the size of the shrimp they serve in the shrimp cocktail -- large as shrimp go, but not huge. There was no lobster.

Still, it does look like enough food for an entrée.

[innlady1]

I just wrote that we had the opportunity to buy ... not that we did. :D We didn't buy any, but a few of our fellow passengers did. That reminds me to tell you about the situation at the gangplank coming aboard. They have what they call the alcohol check station. People who come aboard with alcohol are sent over to that table. We have not hung around to watch or done it ourselves, so I can't speak from personal experience, but we presume that is where the bottle of, say, blue curacao is taken and stowed to be returned on the last night to carry ashore. We also presume that is where you get your wine either stowed for last day, or stickered and you pay the $18 corkage fee.

 

Dave

 

Bingo! They were doing a lot of business on our recent Noordam cruise...people who bought wine in port, unaware of the policy changes, and getting hit with the $18 corkage fee....lots of stored bottles of wines. And probably lots of unhappy cruisers....

[Copper10-8]

Enjoying your review Dave. Did you taste any Curacao?

[RetiredMustang]

Enjoying your review Dave. Did you taste any Curacao?

 

Yes, John, I did. I tried the traditional orange-flavored one of course, but I also tried two of their new ones -- chocolate and rum-raisin. All were tasty!

 

Dave

[RetiredMustang]

Feb. 25, Willemstad, Curacao (cont.)

We spent a couple of hours on our balcony in the afternoon, watching the crew and shore personnel offload trash, pump water and fuel, etc. (like the old joke: work fascinates us, we could watch all day).

We also watched activity ashore and just enjoyed the view of the megapier, and the sweep along the coast to the Rif Fort and the city beyond:

More later,

Dave

[RetiredMustang]

Feb. 25, Willemstad, Curacao (cont.)

Here are the dinner menus:

I had one of my favorite HAL dishes, four mushroom soup:

Followed by another favorite, calf’s liver with bacon, onions and apples:

Here is the dessert menu:

I had the black forest cake; although the cake was ladyfingers instead of the traditional rich dark chocolate cake, it was still tasty:

More later,

Dave

[RetiredMustang]

Still, it does look like enough food for an entrée.

 

Ruth,

 

Yes, it was. I have found the entrees to be plenty of food. In fact, we started going with only one starter instead of two years ago because it was enough (especially if we wanted to have appetite for something chocolate for dessert. :D)

 

Dave

Edited February 26, 2014 by RetiredMustang

[RetiredMustang]

Feb. 26, Oranjestad, Aruba

Today is:

Here are the photos of today’s program:

More later,

Dave

[Krazy Kruizers]

Wonderful review Dave.

Your tour looks great.

[RetiredMustang]

Feb. 26, Oranjestad, Aruba (cont.)

We have booked a morning excursion to go to two different sites to snorkel. We enjoy snorkeling, and Aruba has some good places to do so.

Here are the Aruba info sheets from the Explorer:

More later,

Dave

[1of4]

Thanks again Dave. My toes are thawing as I read...-20 something here right now...

 

If you don't mind me asking: do your bring a portable scanner with you?

 

Enjoy your day.

[innlady1]

Lucky you, Dave. The mushroom soup AND Liver & Onions... We didn't have either on the Maasdam or Noordam...and I missed it.

[RetiredMustang]

...

 

If you don't mind me asking: do your bring a portable scanner with you?

 

...

 

Actually, no, I don't bring a scanner. Those posts with printed material are all photos. I know you did photos on your recent Ryndam review (which I enjoyed very much, thanks!), but I guess they may have been from an I-phone, and I don't know how to edit photos from a phone. I use a small digital camera, and I take the photos at medium-resolution, crop them in Paint, and then adjust brightness and contrast in Microsoft Office. I then upload them to photobucket.

 

After my last cruise, a TA from Amsterdam where I had problems with the amount of times my photos on the free plan could be viewed in a month, I bought the first level above free to be able to have pretty much unlimited band width for folks to view. I had seen the price and thought it was per month; it was only recently I read it more closely and found out it was a small amount per year, which made it a reasonable deal.

 

After I upload them to photobucket, I open CC in another window, and copy and paste the photos from photobucket to my CC post. Works for me!

 

Dave

Edited February 26, 2014 by RetiredMustang

[RetiredMustang]

Feb. 26, Oranjestad, Aruba (cont.)

We had taken this excursion a couple of times before, and enjoyed it, so we signed up again this trip. We went ashore at about 8:40 and filled out forms (“you acknowledge that stuff happens on a snorkel trip, and no matter what, you can’t sue us, our affiliates, subsidiaries, cousins or heirs, or the guy who cleans the heads”) and waited for a bit. We then walked across the pier and out a side gate and boarded a catamaran. We motored out of the harbor and the crew hoisted sail and set off at a fair clip along the coast north of Oranjestad.

We sailed about 45 minutes and tethered at a spot near the northern tip of the island:

There were lots of people and boats about, but we had a fabulous 30 minutes or snorkeling in 6-10 feet of water. I saw lots of fish, many different kinds of sponges and coral, including a robins-egg-blue one I had not seen before. I also saw a sea snake. DW said she saw a flounder moving from spot to spot and changing colors each time. If you are a snorkeler, this is a prime spot. This is probably not a tour for a beginning snorkeler, as we entered the water and re-boarded the boat in deep water. If you are not comfortable diving or flopping into water you can’t stand up in, consider something else. If you are an experienced snorkeler, this is one of the better ones we have experienced in the Caribbean.

After snorkeling the first site for about 30 minutes, we then re-boarded the boat and went a few hundred yards to the wreck of a German merchant boat whose captain scuttled her in 1940 during WWII to avoid being captured by the Dutch. He and his crew were interned on Bonaire for the duration of the war, according to our guide. But, the winds were high, and the waters murky, so we could not see much of the wreck. But, the rum punch on the way back to the ship helped. What a wonderful, warm but not hot, sunny day in Aruba! Here are a couple of shots of Ryndam in Aruba, taken from the catamaran, and one of the city taken from our balcony:

More later,

Dave

[POA1]

When you get home, try an app called Camscanner. It's available for both iOS & Android. It deskews document photos so that the look scanned.

[1of4]

Actually, no, I don't bring a scanner. Those posts with printed material are all photos. I know you did photos on your recent Ryndam review (which I enjoyed very much, thanks!), but I guess they may have been from an I-phone, and I don't know how to edit photos from a phone. I use a small digital camera, and I take the photos at medium-resolution, crop them in Paint, and then adjust brightness and contrast in Microsoft Office. I then upload them to photobucket.

 

Dave

 

Thanks for the explanation, I have a lot to learn. My photos were taken with my Nikon DSLR. I edited them in an older version of photo shop and then up loaded to Shutter fly. I guess there is a difference in size of photos between photo bucket and Shutter fly because your pictures on cc are larger. I scanned all the printed material when I got home and saved them with high resolution but they were still illegable.

 

I will go over your steps and see if I can make it work for me and the electronics I am bringing to Australia in 3 weeks.

 

Thanks again.

Edited February 26, 2014 by 1of4

[1of4]

When you get home, try an app called Camscanner. It's available for both iOS & Android. It deskews document photos so that the look scanned.

 

Thanks for this, I will look into it

[RetiredMustang]

Feb. 26, Oranjestad, Aruba (cont.)

Here are the dinner menus:

For starter, I had the pistou soup:

For the main dish, I had the strip loin steak:

We decided not to have dessert, but here is the menu:

After dinner, we attended the show, a comedian from Seattle, Rod Long. Very funny!

More later,

Dave

[RetiredMustang]

Feb. 27, at sea

Today is:

Here are photos of today’s program:

More later,

Dave

[catl331]

last two meals--I was right on!!!