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LIVE 💎 Jewel 💎 of the Seas - Southern Caribbean 1/20/24

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SteelCityCruiser10 "Live from...." Rare

SteelCityCruiser10

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Alright ladies and gents, let’s get another party started.  I like to refer to my LIVE reports as “tag alongs” rather than a “review” since I lean more towards sharing my experiences & observations with as many pics as possible.  I will post final thoughts at the end to close.  

 

We are a pretty easy going couple in our 40’s who are currently 🎶🎶 “stuck in colder weather”  🎶🎶  

 

I heard the Zac Brown Band song (Colder Weather) today for the first time in awhile and it resonated with me as to how I feel about seeing Jewel of the Seas again….  

 

🎶He said, "I wanna see you again
But I'm stuck in colder weather
Maybe tomorrow will be better
Can I call you then?"🎶

 

 

Current situation 

IMG_1492.thumb.jpeg.d72cbd8e394dfe130e77a9bcdfe17a22.jpeg

 

 

We plan to drop the fur babies at the boarding/daycare facility around 11 tomorrow and hoof it to the airport for a 2 pm flight to SJU.   If all goes as planned we will be in Puerto Rico by this time tomorrow.  

 

Future situation… ☀️☀️☀️

IMG_1493.thumb.jpeg.f550f6138d5089dd9e0e17edd8587f28.jpeg

 

More to come…

 

 

 

 

 

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SteelCityCruiser10 "Live from...." Rare

SteelCityCruiser10

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I decided to try something different this cruise and stay 2 nights with 1 full day in San Juan pre cruise instead of the usual 1 night.  

 

We will be staying at the Condado Ocean Club for those 2 nights pre cruise.  It’s an adult only boutique style hotel on the beach with what looks to be an amazing deck/pool area.  

 

IMG_1494.thumb.jpeg.9d40e98cdcd54e63ec14bb422383fd71.jpeg

 

 

 

IMG_1495.thumb.jpeg.a3d8c47f6f5fc4c1fe90d19bd0df27fc.jpeg

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SteelCityCruiser10 "Live from...." Rare

SteelCityCruiser10

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Now a bit about the cruise itinerary.  7 night S. Caribbean.  
 

IMG_1491.thumb.jpeg.1ed909504ee06a166eca08d8e55ec656.jpeg

 

IMG_1489.thumb.jpeg.a437154b42b8ea36f518e7ab16b01575.jpeg

 

We have boarding time of 12 noon on Saturday.  We will be in a Grand Suite with surf & stream wifi package for each of us,  3 night dining package and the shocker here for me is that I will be WITHOUT the deluxe drink package for the first time ever  😱😱😱😱😱😱😱

 

This is our first cruise since turning D+ so we will have 10 drink vouchers between the 2 of us and free drinks during the suites happy hours.  This is my reasoning for going drink package-less on this one.  DW has the refreshment package & I pre ordered a 12 pack of liter Evians for the room.

 

 

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h20skibum "Live from...." Rare

h20skibum

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Getting out of town before the next snow arrives on Friday.  
 

The couple times we sailed from San Juan, we stayed in the Condado area, but at the Marriott Resort.  Will be interested to see what you think of the Ocean Club. 
 

Enjoy. 

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SteelCityCruiser10 "Live from...." Rare

SteelCityCruiser10

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2 hours ago, h20skibum said:

Getting out of town before the next snow arrives on Friday.  
 

The couple times we sailed from San Juan, we stayed in the Condado area, but at the Marriott Resort.  Will be interested to see what you think of the Ocean Club. 
 

Enjoy. 

Yes - i saw potentially 4 inches snow in my area on Friday night/saturday morning.

 

 I had initially reserved the isla verde courtyard resort but ended up changing it.

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SteelCityCruiser10 "Live from...." Rare

SteelCityCruiser10

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7 hours ago, GetToLivin said:

I love the itineraries of smaller ships, looking forward to following along and seeing your ports of call!

Definitely!  The itinerary was the draw on this one.  Almost all are new ports to us except for San Juan and St. Maarten.

 

I do like that we have at least 1 sea day and we have the free day pre-cruise tomorrow to decompress,  take in the sunshine (🤞🏻), listen to the waves crash … ahh i can hear it now

 

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SteelCityCruiser10 "Live from...." Rare

SteelCityCruiser10

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So in thinking about transportation from the airport to hotel later today I found that San Juan doesn’t have Lyft, only Uber.  And taxis of course.  

 

For whatever reason I have always used Lyft as my default and apparently never downloaded or setup anything with Uber.  I went ahead and got that setup just in case it’s needed later.

 

 Hotel estimates around $25 taxi fare (recommended cash payment) from SJU to the hotel.  I’ll check Uber prices when we land and go from there.

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FionaMG "Live from...." Rare

FionaMG

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Loved Barbados and Santa Lucia when we visited them on a Serenade cruise back in 2017. I am trying to get us back to them again.

 

Have a great trip. 😍

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countess5 "Live from...." Rare

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Jumping on board! Based on your avatar you are from the other end of the state. Philly here!

Following along to get us through to February 10th when we head to Ft Lauderdale to start our winter cruise ( on Celebrity ) however we did sail on Anthem this past summer in the Med. Both Celebrity and RCCl fans.

 

Thanks for posting!

 

Cheers! 

 

 

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SG65CB

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We always gravitated to Old San Juan pre-cruise, but last year we stayed in Condado. The main street is great, tons of restaurants, bars, and shops and lots of people out and about, everything is walking distance. We ate at Orozco's, the place to go if you want traditional PR food. 

 

I agree about the drink package, with D+ and suite lounge it's not needed, and especially when there are 5 port days. 

 

When it was time to go to the ship we asked the hotel desk clerk to call a cab and the taxi arrived pretty quickly. One thing about taxis is they add $1 per bag. Not sure if Uber does this too, probably not.

 

Following... I'm also interested in your Trinidad and Tobago experience.

 

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doghog

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We have always liked leaving out of OSJ as the cruises are port intensive. Not sea day fans. March 2022 on the Explorer was our last B2B cruise out of OSJ and will probably "(?)" be our last. The only reason is we don't like the long days and long flights. 

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Tree_skier "Live from...." Rare

Tree_skier

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13 hours ago, SteelCityCruiser10 said:

Now a bit about the cruise itinerary.  7 night S. Caribbean.  
 

IMG_1491.thumb.jpeg.1ed909504ee06a166eca08d8e55ec656.jpeg

 

IMG_1489.thumb.jpeg.a437154b42b8ea36f518e7ab16b01575.jpeg

 

We have boarding time of 12 noon on Saturday.  We will be in a Grand Suite with surf & stream wifi package for each of us,  3 night dining package and the shocker here for me is that I will be WITHOUT the deluxe drink package for the first time ever  😱😱😱😱😱😱😱

 

This is our first cruise since turning D+ so we will have 10 drink vouchers between the 2 of us and free drinks during the suites happy hours.  This is my reasoning for going drink package-less on this one.  DW has the refreshment package & I pre ordered a 12 pack of liter Evians for the room.

 

 

Oh, this is going to be epic... I'm here for the ride 🙂 

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SteelCityCruiser10 "Live from...." Rare

SteelCityCruiser10

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3 hours ago, countess5 said:

Jumping on board! Based on your avatar you are from the other end of the state. Philly here!

Following along to get us through to February 10th when we head to Ft Lauderdale to start our winter cruise ( on Celebrity ) however we did sail on Anthem this past summer in the Med. Both Celebrity and RCCl fans.

 

Thanks for posting!

 

Cheers! 

 

 

Yup - Western PA - Pittsburgh area

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SteelCityCruiser10 "Live from...." Rare

SteelCityCruiser10

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14 minutes ago, doghog said:

We have always liked leaving out of OSJ as the cruises are port intensive. Not sea day fans. March 2022 on the Explorer was our last B2B cruise out of OSJ and will probably "(?)" be our last. The only reason is we don't like the long days and long flights. 

Totally Agree regarding the flights.  Our last cruise was on Radiance out of Seward AK.    Those flights from PIT to ANC were brutal.  These shouldn’t be too bad.  Just trying to look forward to the final destination.

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doghog

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13 minutes ago, SteelCityCruiser10 said:

Totally Agree regarding the flights.  Our last cruise was on Radiance out of Seward AK.    Those flights from PIT to ANC were brutal.  These shouldn’t be too bad.  Just trying to look forward to the final destination.

If we lived on the East coast (West coast), we'd still be cruising out of OSJ. For us to make the trip worth it we'd always take a red eye (🤬) and could never get direct flights so always a (one) layover. We liked to get into OSJ in the early afternoon. Enjoy your cruise. I'll be tagging along. Bon Voyage. 🍻

 

BTW, the Jewel is a favorite of ours. 

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SteelCityCruiser10 "Live from...." Rare

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Obligatory luggage photo with bonus footage of over-excited pups lol

 

We are right on schedule.  Dog drop went off without a hitch.

 

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I had pre bought the parking because PIT airport is under a revitalization project aka major construction & economy cheapo parking WILL sell out.  Learned that one the hard way.  Orange signs galore!!  So many in fact it’s sensory overload.  Very confusing.

 

 

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Stopped for lunch at Bar Symon Kitchen & Taphouse.  It’s pretty much our pre- vacation ritual at this point.

 

We split a BLT w/ rosemary fries.  Went with the FatHeads Headhunter IPA on draft.  One of my faves.  

 

Sorry no food pics on this one.IMG_1505.thumb.jpeg.50eec72ea921c2dfc2543d7dfa1808a4.jpeg

 

 

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doghog

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43 minutes ago, SteelCityCruiser10 said:

Went with the FatHeads Headhunter IPA on draft.  One of my faves.  

 

Sorry no food pics on this one.

No need. You had me at the IPA. 

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