Beagle Feels a Warm Caribbean Breeze – Review with Pics

[MEUB1112]

Great Review, I'll be following.

[Florings]

Enjoying your review.  October 2020 before we are on the Breeze, and loving all the pictures of the ship!

[Beagleluv6107]

On 4/11/2019 at 12:37 PM, MEUB1112 said:

Great Review, I'll be following.

Thanks for following MEUB1112, 

I plan to get to the next installment on Monday. 

[Beagleluv6107]

On 4/11/2019 at 1:26 PM, Florings said:

Enjoying your review.  October 2020 before we are on the Breeze, and loving all the pictures of the ship!

 

Hey Florings, 

Thanks for following along! At least you have a plan... right now we have no cruises booked and I don’t care for that! I like something on the books to keep me sane! 🤗

[Beagleluv6107]

Day 6 – San Juan

 

We had to get up bright and early this day. I had set up a tour for us with Louie’s VIP Tours. He came highly recommended by another tour company I tried to book. Prior to the cruise, Louie and I kept in touch via email. He told me to get my group off the ship as soon as possible. I saw on the funtimes we could not leave until 8:15 so I told the squad to meet at 8:15. Thinking the bulk of the crowd would be out of our way. We got up at 7 and I sent DH to deck 10 for breakfast burritos. We ate out on our balcony. That was a real treat!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Beagleluv6107]

We met Louie at 8:30. There were 4 other people from our ship already in his van. I stuffed myself into the back of the van in the last row. I felt like I had to do that since this adventure was my idea. We drove around downtown San Juan in morning rush hour traffic. I looked at DH and he looked at me and we both had sweat pouring off us. UT-OH. I text my friend in the front seat to beg Louie to turn up the AC. Turns out, if the van doesn’t get over 50mph the AC doesn’t work. There were no seats for us to move to as there were 10 of us. Eventually, Louie pulls over at a random hotel and picks up two more people. I was overheated, sweating to death, and pretty annoyed at this point. If I had any idea, he was going to shove two more people into this hot box, I would have made sure they got stuck back there it that last row. At this point, I cannot look at DH because I know he’s over there melting, and I didn’t want to see the look on his face. Eventually, the van got up to 55mph going down the highway, but we didn’t feel much air back there. Luckily, I didn’t feel car sick. I had taken 3 ginger pills that morning. We stopped off at a river and Louie gave us bread to feed the fishes. I was just happy to get out of the back.

 

 

 

 

 

 

We loaded back up and went to a new location where we hiked down a path to a little stream and swimming spot. Louie was able to tell us everything about the area and what things were like before and after the hurricanes. Louie is a great guy and a great story teller. He has a knack for it.

 

 

 

[Beagleluv6107]

Here's a few more pictures from this part of the tour

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Beagleluv6107]

Here's the make shift vent my friend made me to try and help. 

We piled back in the van and headed the Yokahu tower. This is where things took a turn for the worst for me. I did get car sick along the winding road leading up to the top of this mountain. By the time I got out of there, I told Louie I wasn’t driving back with him and what were the odds I could call an Uber? My face was ghostly white, and I was shaking. However, the walk up the tower did me a world of good. At the top, the breeze was blowing sweet cool air. Louie told us all about the sights we were seeing at the top. He was so captivating that everyone within earshot stopped and listened to him the entire time. They got a little narration for free!

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Beagleluv6107]

We left there and made another pit stop at an old swimming hole that had been drained. There was a 3000-year-old tree that we rubbed for luck. It’s hard to tell what you’re looking at but this is where we rubbed for luck.

 

 

My luck did change as one of my buddies agreed to swap seats with me. Bless his heart! After that, we stopped for lunch it was around 12:45. Louie took us to a restaurant / road side stand for some authentic food. The place was called La Muralla. It did not disappoint. I think this picture is beef inside a fried green banana and a fried pork chop with beans and rice. We also had a shot of some type of cinnamon drink they make there. I think it was called Coquito. I also guzzled a beer. I desperately needed that after my ordeal.

 

[Beagleluv6107]

We were back at the pier at 2pm and we paid Louie and gave him a tip. Later that night, he sent me a text apologizing for the hot ride. Thank you Louie, I hope you got that fixed by now!  We walked around the shops for a bit and didn’t find much. We went and hung out on Deck 10 at the Blue Iguana and then I took a few pictures of us sailing away from San Juan.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Beagleluv6107]

Tonight was the second elegant night. It was a great menu. Sorry I didn’t get a chance to take a picture. I had the crab cakes and stuffed pepper. DH had the mushrooms and steak and shrimp.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This night the wait staff had to get up and sing. I feel bad for them but it didn’t stop me from taking a picture, shame on me.

 

I went back to my room to change into warm clothes. The Blush dining room is nice and warm but deck 4 and deck 5 are freezing. You need a winter coat just to walk around. We stopped by the Red Frog and watched Travis for a few. Then we went and grabbed seats for the comedy show. We grabbed the seats at 10:45 for a 11:15 show. Boy, we were happy we did. It gets to be standing room only in there.

 

 

 

 

our comedian was Mike Paramore. I don’t know if it was that last drink I had or it was Mike, but I laughed and laughed and laughed. He really had the crowd cracking up. After that, it really was midnight and time for pizza. Each time we got pizza we ordered a whole pie with extra cheese, mushrooms and pepperoni. Oh, it was so amazing!! I must have forgot a pic this night. But I got this guy.

[RRLLAL]

Thanks for the review! We are doing the exact same cruise and itinerary in October.

[Florings]

Gorgeous pictures of the San Juan countryside!   

[RDDAILY]

23 hours ago, Beagleluv6107 said:

 

My luck did change as one of my buddies agreed to swap seats with me. Bless his heart! After that, we stopped for lunch it was around 12:45. Louie took us to a restaurant / road side stand for some authentic food. The place was called La Muralla. It did not disappoint. I think this picture is beef inside a fried green banana and a fried pork chop with beans and rice. We also had a shot of some type of cinnamon drink they make there. I think it was called Coquito. I also guzzled a beer. I desperately needed that after my ordeal.

 

 

It is coquito!!  It's like eggnog on steroids   It's made with coconut rum and is delicious.

 

[Joebucks]

Great review! Makes us all jealous that we aren't on a cruise right now.

 

I love my Red Frog tumbler. It's only for cruises!

[Beagleluv6107]

21 hours ago, RRLLAL said:

Thanks for the review! We are doing the exact same cruise and itinerary in October.

Hey RRLLAL,

Your gonna love it!!!  

[Beagleluv6107]

2 hours ago, RDDAILY said:

 

Hey RDDAILY,

I'm so glad you tried it. Yes, it's good and I surely needed it. 😉

[Beagleluv6107]

2 hours ago, Joebucks said:

Great review! Makes us all jealous that we aren't on a cruise right now.

 

I love my Red Frog tumbler. It's only for cruises!

Thanks for following along Joebucks! It helps to relive the memories writing a review. It takes a little sting out of it being over so fast!

[Beagleluv6107]

Day 7 – Grand Turk

 

I woke up and immediately felt the ship rocking. The whole gang including DH met without me at 8:30 for breakfast in the Blush dining room. I didn’t want to get out of bed. I did take my ginger pills.

 

The ship was not due to dock until noon so I had some hours before the seas would calm down. Around 9:15 I decided a bloody Mary might make me feel better. In fact, it did but I was worried about feeling too good too early, so I did not order a second round.

 

It sure was not a very pretty start to the day!

[Beagleluv6107]

I perused the buffet and brought a plate back to my cabin. By then DH was back and in the shower. We tried to meet the group for Sushi, but they didn’t open until noon and it was 11:30. The Pig and Anchor was open, so we went there for an early lunch.

 

I took a few pictures as we got close

 

 

 

[Beagleluv6107]

We got off the boat at 12:30 and it was raining little bit. We were not the only ship in port, so it was a bit crowded. We could not make up our minds and eventually wandered down toward Jack’s Shack. It was packed near Jacks, so we stopped short of the crowd and got chairs. We paid 40 bucks for 4 chairs and two umbrellas. I would need that umbrella to shelter me from the rain not the sun. grrr

 

 

 

 

 

[Beagleluv6107]

We were swimming by 12:30 and I tried to snorkel but there wasn’t much to see. This picture shows the water not quite crystal clear.

 

 

I still had fun but ended up getting very cold. I couldn’t lay in the sun to warm up because it was so cloudy with intermittent rain drops. It didn’t bother the boys because they were in the water. I thought they looked thirsty, so I went to grab us all a bucket of beers. It was $32 for 6. It took me awhile because of the crowd.  Eventually, DH got tired of swimming and we both changed into dry clothes and sat up near the bar. The rest of the group joined us, and we ordered some of their famous jerk chicken. I forgot to snap a pic of the chicken.

 

 

 

We decided to walk back to the ship behind Jacks so we could spare our feet all the sand we had just cleaned off. Sadly, as we got close, we ended up back on the beach anyway. At least we found the area to wash off before heading into the shops. We browsed around for a while and then got back on board. I love taking a picture sandwiched in between two massive ships.

 

 

 

The Sunshine used to be the Destiny and in 2008 on my very first cruise, DH and I were married in St. Thomas (the first port of that itinerary). It was nice to see her again, but she did look a little rough. I didn’t take a good picture showing that the Sunshine needed a fresh coat of paint on the outside.

[Beagleluv6107]

While on our way back to our cabin to drop off the beach bag, DH and I were “ducked”.

 

Hopefully you guys know about this. DH had no clue. I only knew because friends had recently sailed on the Horizon and they put these little ducks around the ship. You can go on social media and hastag about the ducks but I don't have FB or Instagram. Cruise Critic is as close to social media as I am. But I wanted to play along so I took my duck to the Cabin and took his picture in my mailbox.

Then I took the little duck to dinner. This was the only reason I could tell you all that we had table 619. I would never remember without this picture. LOL

 

DH had cream of mushroom soup, fried shrimp and lasagna and I had what looks like a stuffed tomato.

 

 

 

 

 

After dinner, I relocated the duck. I would crack up if anyone sees this picture and says that was their cabin.

 

[Beagleluv6107]

We went to the Lobby bar at 7:30 and I got this picture of the MJ String Trio. I couldn’t believe the music they could play with their violins. It was outstanding.

 

Then we went to the Thrill Theater. We did level 2 thrills and chills. I really hoped we would like this ride, but it really beats you up. The only cool thing was when something came out and touched our feet. Other than that, you’re only flung forward and backward. I got some laughs just because my friends were in front of me and it looked like they got the snot beat out of them. I know, I’m a terrible friend. We were all happy to have that over with.

 

 

We went to the comedy show at 8 to see Tommy Drake. I’m afraid he was not funny at all. Sorry Tommy. 

 

I do not have a picture this time, but something tells me pizza was involved before I went to bed.

 

[JaniceB]

Sorry your day in Grand Turk was overcast, at least you didn't get overheated.