Today was a much-needed sea day sandwiched between 2 sets of 4 port days in a row. Even though we did not set an alarm this morning, we still woke up at 8:15am. At least we got over 8 hours of sleep! We took our time getting ready, then went to the Oceanview Buffet for breakfast. It was nice to add some variety after eating basically the same thing for breakfast for the last 5 days (how ironic considering I eat the exact same thing for breakfast every morning at home! Haha)
We spent 2 hours relaxing on our balcony, watching the waves go by, with me writing in my trip journal while DH read a book. Since our cabin is on the starboard side of the ship, we were facing north for today’s journey west. We had shade all day on our balcony, which was great! There was nothing else to see but water because there aren’t any islands in this part of the Caribbean Sea, but maybe people on the port side balconies could see Venezuela?
At noon, DH wanted to get some coffee from Café al Bacio, so I joined him for a walk downstairs. While there, I noticed they were playing archery in the Grand Foyer. It was really a neat set up- they had an inflatable target area and 4 cone-shaped nozzles blowing air straight up so there was a ball hovering mid-air. The contestants had to knock the ball down, either by hitting the ball directly with their arrow, or by hitting the cone so the air stream was blocked and the ball would fall. It was fun to watch, and the players were actually pretty good at it!
Eddy was hosting a game of music trivia name that tune at the pool, so we went upstairs to give it a go. Today’s theme was “Names” so every song title had a name in it and we had to guess both the song title and the artist. They played 15 songs for a total of 30 points. We only got an 18 out of 30, so we didn’t stand a chance because the winner scored a perfect 30! I did think it was fun that they picked songs from the 50’s through the 90’s to appeal to a wider audience, but that also means we are less likely to win because we don’t know most of the older songs.
It had been several hours since our last feeding, so we went upstairs to get something to eat for lunch from the buffet. The theme of the day was Mediterranean food, and they had a specialty station with made to order schwarma. I wasn’t in the mood for that, so I opted for a random assortment of carbs (as usual!). The dumplings from the Asian station were delicious!
For dessert, I went over to the Slush Bar and ordered the Mint Cookie drink. This is by far my favorite drink from this bar, but it is very filling so I only let myself have it one time on this cruise. It’s totally worth it though!
Watching the wake on a lazy sea day
We spent some more time relaxing on the balcony until 2:45pm when we made our way up to the Sky Lounge for another round of music trivia with the CLA staff. Today’s theme was songs from movies, and we had to guess the title of the movie, not the actual song name. They had 20 songs for this game, and some of them were much harder than others! We teamed up with a pair of ladies which did help because we knew the answers to different movies from them, but we still only scored 14 out of 20. I think the winners scored a 17 or 18, so again, we didn’t win, but that’s okay because we made some new friends and we had fun trying!
Next, we went down to the World Class Bar for the mixology class. DH had a great experience with this class on the Equinox, so he wanted to do it again as long as the bartender was teaching about different drinks. The class was taught by one of the World Class Bar bartenders named Marius, and we ended up having a private lesson because we were the only people that showed up!
The class was very different from 2 years ago because instead of DH going behind the bar to actually make the drinks, Marius just talked about the process of how to make each drink, and why they use certain shakers or strainers or whatever other supplies. Last time, we learned about 3 categories of cocktails (a Collins, a Swizzle, and a mojito), whereas this time, Marius taught us how to make 4 specific drinks from the World Class Bar menu. Last time, the class cost $35, but it was only $25 this time (plus a mandatory 18% gratuity). We learned a few new pointers and it did give us an appreciation for the art behind making cocktails, but we weren’t sure how useful it was since it’s not like we will ever make these specific cocktails at home. The drinks he taught us were the Kentucky Calling, Celebrity No. Ten, Ketel One Strawberry Fields, and Zacapa Above the Clouds. For the last one, Marius pulled out the fancy smoker machine, which is always fun to watch.
The class was about an hour long, and then we went back to the cabin to get ready for our second Elegant Chic night.
Random side thought that I am going to talk about now because this was when I took this photo… Sometimes it can be a bit disorienting when you get off the mid-ship elevators on your deck to go back to your cabin. If you didn’t pay attention when you got on the elevator, then you may not know if you are on the port or starboard side of the ship, and then you don’t know if you need to turn left or right out of the elevator and where you need to go to get back to your cabin. Today I had an epiphany! There are different pieces of art hanging on the walls opposite the elevators, and it is different on every deck as well as on the port vs. starboard side. If you take note of which piece of art is on your side of the ship on your deck, then you will know that you are on the correct side if you see that piece of art when stepping off the elevator (and if you do not see that piece of art, then you are on the opposite side of the ship!). This slice of a tree trunk was the art on deck 10, starboard side:
If we stepped off the elevator on deck 10 and saw this, we knew we were on our side of the ship. On top of that, if we saw this tree trunk, we knew we had to turn towards the left to walk in the direction of our cabin. If we got off the elevator and did not see the tree trunk, that meant we were on the port side and needed to turn towards the right and cut through the library to get back to our cabin. It sounds silly, but it really made a huge difference in feeling like we were “home” and knowing our way around the ship! Thank you Celebrity for posting so many different pieces of art to make this solution possible!
It became a game for us to seek out spots around the ship that gave a nice background for a photo when we were all dressed up for the evening. Elegant Chic nights are even harder than casual nights because there are more ship photographers to contend with, but we got creative tonight and took some photos in the library.
When we arrived at the hostess stand for dinner, Cervine greeted us by name and knew our cabin number and preferred table number without us even speaking a word! I think this is one of the (many) benefits of a 14 night cruise. We spend such a long time on the ship that the staff really gets a chance to know us, whereas on a 7 night cruise, the cruise is over before you get a chance to form a routine and know the staff. Dinner was delicious as always, especially since we were seated with our favorite waiters, Pinto and Jose!
Dinner menu
Wild Mushroom Vol-Au-Vent
Traditional Steak Tartare
Classic Chateaubriand
Moroccan Spiced Ahi Tuna Steak
Dessert Menu
Dessert Drinks Menu
Tonight, we decided to try some dessert wines, and we both liked them so much that we asked the sommelier to bring us the bottles so we could take a photo in hopes of buying a bottle to drink at home!
Frosty Ice “Bombe”
Tonight’s show in the main theater was called Amade. There was no real plot to this show, but the best way to describe it is a combination of Lady Gaga and Mozart. The costumes were incredible, and we really enjoyed the dance numbers to modern music. Personally, the highlight for me is always when the aerialists perform because they are extremely talented, especially considering they perform on a moving cruise ship!
I apologize that these photos are so blurry. We always preferred to sit at the back of the theater so we could make a quick escape as soon as the show ended, but that meant I had to zoom in a lot to take my photos and they always came out blurry.
After a full third sea day, we went to bed early tonight, excited to finally arrive at the ABC islands tomorrow!
This was my third visit to Barbados and my third trip to the Boatyard Beach club at Carlisle Bay. It is such a pretty beach with powder-soft white sand, turquoise blue water, and it is close to the cruise port, making it an easy and enjoyable plan for the day. They have a package where $20 USD buys you a lounge chair, a shared umbrella, a cup of rum punch or a beer, use of their bathrooms, use of their water toys on the beach, and free wifi. They also have a bar and restaurant with decent prices if you want to buy lunch. One thing that has changed since our last visit here 3 years ago is that they now also include a short boat ride out to the bay to go snorkeling, whereas we used to have to pay for that separately with a vendor on the beach. We had a not-so-great experience with that last time we were here (see my Carnival Valor review for more details!), so we were happy to have it included with admission this time. The $20 also includes a taxi ride back to the port at the end of the day, but you need to find your own way there in the morning. They open at 9am, so my goal was to leave the ship by 8:30am to get a taxi and arrive there just as they opened so we would get lounge chairs in a prime location.
Today’s daily schedules:
As usual, we started our day with room service breakfast on the balcony.
At 8:30am, we gathered up our bags and took the elevator down to Deck 2 to exit the ship. I have always been on the only cruise ship in port when I visit Barbados and I have always been docked very close to the cruise terminal. Unfortunately, today there was a P&O ship docked in that spot so we were docked further away from the terminal. There is a shuttle to bring you from the gangway to the terminal, but it was not there when we left the ship so we just started walking. It took us 15 minutes and over 2,000 steps on my Fitbit to get from the gangway to the taxi stand on the outside of the cruise terminal! We were walking very quickly because we were eager to get to the beach, so the walk probably would have taken a lot longer at normal walking speeds.
We asked one of the taxi dispatchers for a taxi going to the Boatyard and he directed us to a van that was nearly full. Half of the passengers were getting off downtown for $2 per person, and we were charged $5 per person to get to the Boatyard. I guess they don’t have inflation in Barbados because that is the same price I paid in 2012 and 2015 haha
We arrived at 9:05am and there were already a lot of people at the beach. Our goal was to arrive early enough to get lounge chairs in the front row along the water, and while we did accomplish that, there were only a few chairs left in the front row, so it’s a good thing we didn’t arrive any later! At the entrance, they explained everything included in the package, collected our $20 per person, and gave us each a wrist band with a pull tab flap to redeem for our free included drink. We went down to the beach and got settled in our loungers, and then realized that they never told us about the snorkeling tour. DH went back inside and put or name down on the list for the 10:30am tour. We didn’t know if this was the first tour of the day, but there were already a few names on the list. I usually prefer to snorkel as early in the day as possible before the other tour boats arrive and it gets too crowded, but the schedule is less flexible now that the tour is included with admission.
We spent some time relaxing on our lounge chairs, and then at 10:10am, they made an announcement over the PA system to call several parties by name to go on the tour. This was sooner than we expected so we rushed to get our belongings ready. We took our money, ID, and seapass cards with us in a plastic bag in the pocket of DH’s bathing suit, but we left the rest of our stuff behind on our chairs, including our towels. I am actually pretty sure that they did not allow anyone to bring their bags, towels, or shoes on the boat. It was okay to bring hats, sunglasses, and of course, snorkeling equipment. The reason they called us so early was that everyone was given an inflatable life vest which they put on each of us individually, and they also gave out snorkel equipment if you didn’t bring your own. There were about 25 to 30 people on the tour with us, so that took a few minutes. Once we were all ready, they walked us up the pier and onto the boat. The boat was pretty big, with plenty of seating and shade, and there were cubbies below the seats to stash your hats and sunglasses while swimming.
We went out a short distance into the bay and then dropped anchor next to the ship wreck. There were already 2 or 3 boats snorkeling at this spot, so the water was crowded with lots of swimmers. The heavy winds continued to follow us through the Caribbean, and the water looked very choppy with a strong current. The guides instructed us to stay directly over the ship wreck and not to swim further away, and everyone was required to keep their life vests on at all times.
As soon as I jumped in the water, I immediately felt the current. It was really hard to stay over the ship wreck because as soon as I stopped actively swimming and tried to float, I was carried away. Plus, with so many people in the water, we kept bumping into each other and getting kicked. It was definitely not the greatest of experiences, but on the bright side, the snorkeling was wonderful! This was my third time snorkeling over the ship wreck here, and I think this was the most fish I have seen. There were tons of the sergeant major damselfish that I am used to seeing all over the Caribbean, but there were also lots of other fish. The current made it hard to take good photos, but this is the best of what I could get…
I spy two parrot fish!
I stayed out in the water for 15 minutes, and then went back on the boat to save some energy to swim with the turtles. The guides never told us how long we would stay at this location (and shame on me for forgetting to ask!). It turned out that I could have stayed in the water an extra 15 minutes so I only did half the snorkeling time. That’s okay, we are still going to the other snorkel spot with the turtles, right? Wrong! Once everyone was on board, the guide said we were heading back to the Boatyard. I asked him if we were going to snorkel with the turtles and he said there have not been any turtles in Carlisle Bay for over a week so we were just doing the one snorkel stop today. I understand that the guides probably assume we are all first timers to this our and didn’t know anything was missing, but there was a sign posted at the entrance to the Boatyard which mentioned snorkeling with turtles and when DH signed us up for the our, they told him it is not guaranteed we will see a turtle. That implies that we will TRY to see it, but the guides indicated we were not going to try because it had been so windy all week that there were no turtles in the bay. If that is the case, it would have been nice for someone to tell us that upfront so we would know what to expect. I wasn’t even that upset about missing the turtles… after all, this isn’t a zoo and the turtles are free to come and go from the bay as they please! I was really just bothered by the poor communication. I like to be kept informed so I can make my decisions accordingly, and I would have stayed in the water to explore the ship wreck longer had I known this was our only stop.
Anyway, we got back to the pier at 10:55am and the next group was already lined up to take their tour. I guess they try to make it an efficient process to get guests out to snorkel quickly. From the pier, I could see the cruise ships docked in the distance.
There is also a great view of the Boatyard and the neighboring restaurants and beach clubs. The yellow umbrellas are all part of the Boatyard.
Every lounge chair is occupied by 11:15am so you have to arrive early if you want a seat!
I also wanted to point out those 3 brightly colored Adirondack chairs in front of all the loungers. Those are a new addition since I was last here 3 years ago and they seem to be a big annoyance. When we first arrived this morning, nearly every seat in the front row was occupied, except the seats directly behind those chairs! They have these chairs on the other side of the pier too, and those were also the only vacant seats in the front row on that side. We were lucky to get a spot 3 umbrellas over (you can see our spot if you look closely- it’s the 2 vacant chairs to the left of the Adirondack chairs, with grey towels and my bright teal beach bag on the seat). Notice how there is more space between the sets of lounge chairs that are behind the Adirondack chairs? That’s because the people on either side moved closer to their neighbors so the Adirondacks don’t block their view! I guess these chairs look cute and beachy, but they sure do cause an annoyance to people wanting front row seats with unobstructed views of the beach and water!
My hair was a mess after coming back from snorkeling, so I went to dunk my head under water really quickly. I was holding my camera at eye level to take this photo- notice how close I was to the water line? There is a steep drop off not to far into the water so just be careful not to lose your footing! No need for water shoes here- there is nothing but soft sand on the floor of the bay.
As evidenced in the photos above, our bags were waiting for us back at our lounge chairs when we got back from snorkeling. Unfortunately, the other thing waiting for us was the wind!! It was very windy the whole day and the waves were quite loud crashing in on the shore. Usually the water is very calm here, but not today! Much like we saw in St. Maarten, people kept getting knocked around by the waves. At least it was entertaining to watch them from our front row seats haha
At around 12:30pm, we started to get hungry. We always bring a few Clif Bars into ports with us because they are filled with protein to fill us up, and they meet the requirements of being pre-packaged food that is safe to enter a foreign country. Today, we decided to try something new and we ordered food from the restaurant. We have never tried flying fish and I have read that people really like it so we ordered the Flying Fish Fingers and Fries appetizer to share.
DH placed the order at the bar and they told him to pick it up from the counter when his name was called. They said it would take 30 to 45 minutes for our order to be ready, so we used this opportunity to redeem our free drink coupons. I ordered the Shark Bite (left) and DH ordered the Pirate’s Punch (right), and both were strong and tasty. We brought them over to one of the tables at the restaurant and waited for our food order to be called.
Sure enough, it really did take 45 minutes for our food to be ready! I guess they needed time to go out into the bay to catch the fish fresh for us?? The portion was a bit on the small side, but it was very good and I’m glad I tried it.
We returned to our lounge chairs to enjoy the rest of the afternoon at the beach. This isn’t exactly a calm and relaxing beach because they play loud, upbeat pop and hip hop music in the background, but I enjoy the fun vibe here. At some point, DH went up to the pier to use the rope swing, but I didn’t join him because I was too comfortable sitting in my lounge chair. I was so lazy that I didn’t even take any more photos here for the rest of the day! To be fair, this was my third visit here and not much has changed in the last 6 years, so I guess I just didn’t feel that inspired.
At around 2:30pm, we decided it was time to head back to the ship. When we got to the front parking lot, they immediately directed us to one of the waiting taxis with another couple. I think the first shuttle back leaves around 11:30 or noon, and then the shuttles run every 15 minutes or so for the rest of the day, so there is never much of a wait. The ride only takes about 10 minutes, and they dropped us off at the front of the cruise terminal. We walked passed all the shops and exited at the other end to find a nearly-full shuttle bus that was about to leave. Perfect timing! It was standing room only, but we didn’t mind standing for the 2 minute ride back to the ship, considering that saved us 20 minutes of walking!
Once we were back on the ship, we went upstairs to the Solarium to spend 20 minutes soaking in the hot tub. There were a few people in there already when we arrived, and they were still in there when we got out. I always thought you aren’t supposed to sit in a hot tub for too long, and the water actually was quite hot, so it seemed weird to me that these people were spending so much time sitting there, but I guess it’s not for me to judge!
Neither of us was feeling 100 percent tonight. I’m not sure if it was a little sea sickness from the boat rocking so much, or maybe it was dehydration, but we both just felt off. Instead of our usual routine of bar hopping before dinner, we decided to take it easy and relax in the cabin. For the first time ever, we spent a few hours watching TV! I watch tons of TV when I’m at home, but I have never spent any time watching TV on a cruise ship before! We found a marathon of Property Brothers running on HGTV, so that was the perfect way to pass the time until we had enough energy to go downstairs for dinner. I was kind of bummed that I didn’t feel well tonight because this was another new menu for us and I was really looking forward to trying some of the new dishes! The first appetizer on the list was Hawaiian Tuna Poke. In the last year or two, poke bowl restaurants have popped up all over San Jose and it is one of our favorite dinners, so I was really looking forward to trying Celebrity’s version.
Tonight’s menu:
Poached Anjou Pear and Gorganzola Cheese
Hawaiian Tuna Poke (this was delicious and had I had more of an appetite, I would have asked for a second round of it!)
Pappardelle Con Funghi
I am still disappointed that I didn’t have more of an appetite that night because I would have loved to try the pate and the lamb kebab, but I guess that’s a good excuse to take another cruise! In the end, I only had room for my 2 appetizers and about half of my entrée, so I definitely didn’t have room for dessert. We finished eating rather quickly since we didn’t order as many courses as we usually do, so we just wondered around the ship to walk off the meal. They have this funky wall sculpture back near the entrance to the Ensemble Lounge, and we thought it made a nice background for a photo.
I really like this piece that is located next to Qsine. It reminds me of origami…
The Wine Cellar was almost always empty. I liked the décor in here but we never spent much time here because it was always deserted and boring. It does make for a pretty place to take photos though!
Tonight’s show was a solo performer named Liam Ryder. We thought he was a very talented pianist, and a pretty good singer. He played a few classical music pieces, and a few rock and roll songs.
My favorite part was when he played the full version of The Flight of the Bumble Bee and played a cartoon that was perfectly synced to it. I was able to find the cartoon on Youtube so you can see what I am talking about. Imagine seeing this live with the cartoon playing on a big screen at the back of the stage, and a pianist playing the music perfectly synced to the cartoon. I can’t really give him credit for the cartoon itself, but seeing him keep up with the music was absolutely incredible to watch in person.
After the show, we were feeling much better so we went over to Café Al Bacio for dessert. The cakes in that display case always look so yummy, and since we skipped dessert after dinner, we thought this was a good opportunity to finally try it out. DH had the coconut cake, and I had a slice of strawberry chiffon cake. Honestly, both were just okay and they looked a lot better than they tasted. Maybe it just wasn’t sweet enough for me?
Tonight was one of the theme parties up in the Sky Lounge, so we headed up there to check it out. The Eclipse Orchestra performed songs from the Big Band era while the performance dancers danced to it.
The Sky Lounge has a terrible set up for a show like this where everyone wants to see the dance floor. The chairs and banquets are positioned poorly and block your view, and there are thick support beams surrounding the dance floor area. There are very few seats offering a good view, so people end up standing around the perimeter of the dance floor, just behind the first row of chairs, and that blocks everyone else’s view. We had to keep asking people to move so we could see the show from where we were sitting, and it made for a frustrating experience. We stayed for about 20 minutes, then gave up and grabbed a quick snack at the buffet before going to sleep just before midnight.
Step Tracker Daily Total: 7,632 steps; 3.060 miles
This was our second time visiting St. Lucia together, and my third time here. When we were here in 2015, we did a zip lining tour at the Treetop Adventure Park. We had a great time there and briefly considered just booking the same tour again, but I wanted DH to see some more of the island. My first time here, I took an island tour with Cosol, and I loved seeing the famous Pitons. I really wanted DH to see the Pitons and visit Sugar Beach, so I researched our options. The thing I didn’t like about Cosol’s tour was that we spent a lot of our day sitting in the tour van and driving around the island, so I wasn’t interested in booking that same tour again. Spencer Ambrose gets wonderful reviews both on Trip Advisor and on Cruise Critic. He offers a land and sea combo tour which takes a speed boat to and from the town of Soufriere, thus cutting out much of the driving portion of the day. His website offers a detailed description of the tour, and we could book a reservation online by paying a $10 per person deposit, with the remainder of the cost due in cash on the day of the tour.
Today’s daily schedule
Today was another early morning for us, starting with room service delivering our breakfast at 7am. We were happy to see that they delivered the smoked salmon today!
As we were eating, the Eclipse made a 180 degree turn before docking, so we had wonderful views around the port area.
We finished eating and headed downstairs as soon as the ship was cleared at 8am. Our instructions told us to find our group in the port shopping area, and it couldn’t have been easier to spot the lady holding a big sign with the Spencer Ambrose logo as soon as we stepped into the terminal. She checked our name off on her list, gave us each a wrist band, and collected the rest of our money to pay for the tour ($96 USD per person). We waited a few minutes for the rest of the group to arrive, then we walked a short distance across the parking lot to a dock where we loaded into 2 speed boats. I thought it was a little strange that each boat had half people for the tour we were taking (the Land and Sea Combo) and half people for the Beach Break Tour. Perhaps there wasn’t enough people on the beach tour to fill a full boat? The boats were fairly new with ample seating around the perimeter, but not very much shade.
All ready to go!
By 8:45am, we were on our way, and spent about 30 minutes speeding around to the other side of the island. The guides explained that we would make several stops along the coast on our way back at the end of the day, but for now, we just needed to get to Soufriere ASAP to beat the other tour buses.
First sight of the famous Pitons! They were just as majestic as I remembered them!
I thought we were the only cruise ship in St. Lucia today, but it turns out that we had company. There was a Silverseas ship anchored on this side of the island.
I was a little surprised when we took a detour to look at the bat cave. I expected that to be part of the tour later this afternoon, but maybe we don’t pass it then? Anyway, the bat cave is a crack in the cliffs where hundreds of bats are hiding. The boat got pretty close to the cave and we could hear the bats, but it was hard to see inside. I tried using the zoom on my camera but I don’t think I can see any bats. Don’t worry though, they are in there and don’t seem to have much interest in flying out to see us!
We only stayed here for about 5 minutes- long enough to take a few photos and for the guides to tell us about the bats. Next, we continued to the dock in Soufriere where we got off the boat and loaded into a 12-person van for the land portion of our tour.
We drove for about 10 minutes to our first stop: the mud baths and volcano tour. There wasn’t enough time to do both activities so we had to pick just one, and everyone in our van except one couple opted for the mud baths. Here is a description of the baths from their website:
“The Soufriere Volcano (Sulphur Springs) last erupted in the 1700’s – over 200 years! It originated from a weak spot in the crust of a collapsed volcanic crater, and is considered to be a dormant volcano – unlike the active Soufriere Hills Volcano in the island of Montserrat. One of the best features of the volcano is the ability to dive into the mud baths. The mud baths at Sulphur Springs attract people from all over the world because it detoxifies the body and helps heal sun burns, eczema, arthritis, sore joints, and more.”
These are the prices for the mud baths if you visit here on your own (it was included in the price of our tour):
The guides told us to leave all of our jewelry in the van because it would get ruined if exposed to the sulfur. I don’t usually wear any expensive jewelry off the ship in the Caribbean anyway, but I didn’t want to tarnish my costume jewelry so I discretely removed it and put it in a small pocket in my beach bag. Realistically, I doubt the driver of our van would try to steal anyone’s jewelry. It would be easy to know who took it since he was the only one left alone with our bags, and I doubt he would risk his job over petty theft. Just keep this in mind to leave any of your expensive or sentimental pieces of jewelry on the ship if you are planning to visit the mud bath!
As soon as I stepped out of the van, I was confronted with a strong smell of sulfur. It honestly wasn’t that bad, and I got used to it after a few minutes, but the air definitely did smell like rotten eggs. If you have a poor tolerance for bad odors, this might not be your favorite part of the tour.
Wearing just our bathing suits and flip flops, we walked down a flight of stone steps to a small area with 2 or 3 picnic tables. The guides told us to leave our towels and flip flops here, and to give them our cameras so they could take photos of us in the baths. They told us to step down into the pool of hot water and to soak there for a few minutes to allow our pores to open up. Be very careful here as the stones were slippery and the muddy water was too dark to see your footing as you climbed down the steps inside the pool.
The guides helped us to climb out the far end of the pool, and they directed us to the plastic tubs of mud. There were 2 types of mud: a light grey color and a dark black color. The guides told us to apply the light mud in thin layers all over our skin and to let it dry and harden. The dark mud can stain your clothing, so they said not to use it, but if you did want to use it, you could apply it on top of the grey mud as a decoration. It was a little weird that the tubs of mud hardly had anything in them. As you can see, we didn’t have much mud to work with, but we got it on as best we could.
You can barely see it, but I promise, we did have some mud on us!
After the mud was dry, the guides told us to get back in the hot pool of water to wash it off. There were some tiny rocks in the mud, so as we rubbed it off, it exfoliated our skin. It was slippery, but it felt nice, and the warm water felt great.
In the background of this photo, you can see the picnic tables where we left our stuff.
I did bring my towel with me, but opted to just air dry when I got out of the pool. We had 2 more stops that involved getting in the water and I wanted to keep my towel dry for as long as possible. Once we were all out of the baths, we walked back up the stairs to wait for our van to pick us up. In all, we were at this top for 30 minutes and were finished by 10am.
At the top of the stairs, there is a small “Vending Village” if you want to shop for souvenirs. I didn’t look closely so I don’t know how the prices were, but I can’t imagine it was any cheaper than you would find near the cruise port.
This was our van for the land portion of the tour. It had 4 rows of seat, with 3 people per row, and the air conditioning was cold and strong!
Our next stop was about a 10 minute drive away on the opposite side of Soufriere: The Toraille Waterfall.
This was one of our guides- she left the mud mask on from the baths so it would work a little better. She must have wonderful skin if she applies a mud mask every day she visits there with a tour group!!
We spent about 20 minutes here, with just enough time to hop in the pool of water below the waterfall. There were changing rooms available if you needed it, but we were all wearing our bathing suits already.
Just a warning: the water here is FREEZING cold! I guess some might consider this refreshing, but I just thought it was freezing… especially after soaking in the hot water at the mud baths! Also, the entrance is very rocky, so I would recommend wearing aqua socks if you have them. The guides encouraged us to stand under the waterfall for a “power shower,” but that was too adventurous for me haha
We only had about 20 minutes to spend here, but that was plenty of time because the water was too cold to want to stay much longer. On our way out, there were a few vendors set up on the street, offering samples of hot sauce, banana ketchup, and spiced rum (and of course they had bottles for sale if you liked what you tasted). They also sold a few souvenirs and crafts.
At 10:45, the guides rounded us up to get back in the van. That was the end of the land portion of the tour, so we drove back down to the marina to wait for our boat to pick us up. Given how steep and windy the roads are in St. Lucia, and how long it takes to drive from the cruise port to these popular tourist destinations in Soufriere, I much preferred the way Spencer Ambrose structures his tour over how Cosol did things back in 2012. It was now only 11am and I felt like we had already done so much today. We were the first tour groups to arrive at both the mud bath and the waterfall, so it wasn’t crowded, and it felt like a better use of our limited time in port.
We had a short wait when we got back to the dock because the person bringing our food for lunch had not yet arrived. No worries though, we had a nice view of one of the Pitons in the background!
Notice the orange stain all over DH’s bathing suit? Unfortunately, the sulfur in the water at the mud baths stained everything that was light in color. Not only did it ruin his bathing suit, but it stained the little white flowers on my bikini, the white band of my waterproof watch, and even the plastic band of DH’s snorkel goggles (and he didn’t even wear those in the mud bath! It must have rubbed off from his hair when we went snorkeling nearly 2 hours later!!). When we got back on the cruise ship at the end of the day, we rinsed out the bathing suits, and then we ran them through the washing machine when we got home, but it’s official… the stains are permanent. I honestly think the only bathing suit that would survive that mud bath is one that is solid black, and even that might show a slight orange tint!
When the food was delivered, the guides helped us climb back into the boat for the 5 minute ride around the bay to our next destination. I think this beach used to be called Jealousie Beach, but it is now called Sugar Beach. It is located between the two Pitons and has one of the only white sand beaches in St. Lucia. As we approached the beach, we could see several beautiful white buildings dotting the side of the hill. That was the Viceroy Sugar Beach Resort, a very fancy, high-end resort where rooms run for over $1000 per night.
Of course, we were not going to that part of the beach. The guides explained that all beaches in St. Lucia are public, and we were free to walk along the water for the entire length of this beach. However, the hotel owns the lounge chairs and thatched umbrellas on their side of the beach, and those are mostly reserved for hotel guests. If we wanted to use their chairs on the beach towards the right side of the pier, it would cost $50 per person. As pretty as they looked, that was more money than I wanted to spend for the 2 hours we would be here! I took this photo while standing on the pier, looking to the right towards the hotel property:
This was as close as I got to those fancy schmancy lounge chairs…
As a consolation prize, the hotel allows non-hotel guests to use a small section of the beach to the left side of the pier. These lounge chairs were free to use, even if they weren’t as fancy as the ones near the hotel, and there were a few umbrellas, plus tons of natural shade from the trees overhead. When we arrived, most of the public lounge chairs were occupied, but I spotted 2 vacant loungers up on the ledge in the back row which were perfect for us. Being up on the ledge meant we had a great view, and being in the back row meant we had full shade to hide from the sun. I circled our seats in yellow so you can see what I mean…
We arrived at the beach at 11:30am, and the guides said we would stay here until 2pm. Originally, I wanted to book the Beach Break tour to have more time to spend at this beach, but considering we had 2 and a half hours here, plus the experience of the other stops on the tour, I am glad we took this tour instead. Most tours that I have taken with similar itineraries to this where you make a bunch of stops and then go to a beach to eat lunch, only give you an hour or so at the beach. I was thrilled to have 2 and a half hours to spend here at this beautiful tropical beach! The guides said that it would take them about 15 minutes to set up the food for lunch, so I used that opportunity to walk along the beach and take some quick photos.
Looking back towards the pier:
Promptly at 11:30am, lunch was served buffet style with a choice of jerk chicken (that was NOT spicy at all), fried rice, noodles with saffron sauce, green banana salad (that tasted like potato salad), green salad, and fried plantains. The food was all delicious, even the things that I didn’t think I would like haha
They also had a cooler fully stocked with bottles of water, soda, and beer, and we were free to help ourselves to as much as we wanted. We ate lunch sitting on our lounge chairs, and the guides came around to collect our plates as we finished.
Bellies full, it was time to go snorkeling! The last time I visited this beach, I was a fairly inexperienced snorkeler. The friend I was traveling with did not like snorkeling, so I went out by myself, and I was somewhat intimidated by the current and the noise of boats rushing by overhead. Even though I stayed within the buoys, I still got nervous every time I heard a boat speed by, and it was hard to enjoy the experience. Needless to say, after we booked this cruise and picked this excursion, I was very excited to get a re-do since many people have proclaimed this is their favorite snorkeling spot in the Caribbean!
If you look back at the photo I posted with the lounge chairs on the pubic side of the beach, you can see that the entrance to the water is very rocky. I would definitely recommend wearing something to protect your feet here! I also opted to borrow a life vest from the guides to wrap around my waist to help me float. The best snorkeling spot is along the far right side of the water (when standing on the beach, looking out at the water), and there is a series of ropes and buoys to make a safe section so swimmers do not get hit by the boats coming to/from the pier. Unlike snorkeling tours when you jump in the water from a boat and there are usually guides available to keep an eye on all the swimmers, on this tour, the guides just hang out on the beach to assist with serving the food and drinks. I did not get the feeling that they paid any attention to the swimmers out in the water, so definitely keep your own safety in mind as you are snorkeling!
Ok, let’s go snorkeling!!
My goal for snorkeling today was to take my time. I got in the water at exactly 12 noon, so I had a full 2 hours to spend out here, if I wanted to. I had no reason to rush and I really wanted to take it all in and make sure to cover the whole snorkeling section. Back in 2012, I was afraid to swim too far out, and I honestly had not read many reviews about snorkeling here so I didn’t know what I was looking for. This time around would be different because I have spent the last 5+ years reading reviews and looking at photos of people snorkeling here, and I now know that the best snorkeling is out at the far end of the snorkeling area. My strategy was to swim out all the way to where the ropes ended by staying out in the middle of the water, and then to swim back along the wall, staying closer to the rocks.
Oh my, let me tell you, it was definitely worth it to swim all the way out to the end!! I found these funky pink sponges that completely covered the wall of rocks and continued several feet down below the surface of the water. It was so neat and something I have never seen before! Honestly, I think that is one of the things that gets me the most excited about snorkeling… the possibility of seeing something new that I’ve never seen before. I experienced a lot of firsts when we visited French Polynesia (who ever thought I would get to swim with sharks and octopus?!), so I wasn’t sure if I would discover new things on this trip to the Caribbean. So far, I’ve been doing pretty well, between getting to hold a conch shell for the first time yesterday, and seeing this crazy pink wall today!
I did my best to capture this in a photo, but it was reallllly challenging. The sun kept sneaking behind the clouds, which meant the colors weren’t as bright as they could have been. On top of that, the current was very strong and it was such a windy day that it was hard to hold still to capture a decent photo. I honestly don’t think these photos do it any justice, but I tried…
I think this photo probably shows it best… some of the little round pink balls opened up to reveal bright yellow tentacles popping out! I was so mesmerized by this that I could have stayed out here all afternoon… that is, if I wasn’t constantly being pushed toward the rocks from the current!
As I started to swim back along the rock wall, I found a little alcove that had a bunch of bigger fish hiding in there.
As you can see, the snorkeling here was pretty sparse. Yes, I did see some interesting fish, a little bit of interesting coral, and of course, that amazing wall of pink and yellow spongey thingies, but it was all very spread out. I’m not sure if there just weren’t as many fish here today because of the winds and the choppy water, or if it is normally like this, but you really did have to search to find something worth photographing. Other than that, it was just a lot of rocks.
After 30 minutes of snorkeling, I was getting tired and decided to swim back towards the shore. This is when things got interesting. Holy moly! The current was reallllly strong! No matter how hard I swam towards the shore, I just kept getting pushed further out into the water. I have never swam in one of those endless pool swim spas that I always see commercials for on TV, but I would imagine this is what it must feel like haha It was so frustrating to swim and swim and swim, but not get any closer to shore. At one point, the water was so churned up that I couldn’t see anything in front of me. It was just total darkness, and I started to freak out a little bit because I didn’t want to get thrown into the rocks if I couldn’t see where they were. Eventually, I did make it back to the shore (…obviously, since I lived to finish the cruise and come home to write this review for you to read lol), but I was so exhausted that my legs were shaking and I could barely walk back to our lounge chairs!
I spent the next hour and a half just relaxing on my lounge chair and drinking Piton beer. Originally, I thought I might go out snorkeling again, but I was way too exhausted from round one to even consider attempting round two!
Drinking Piton beer with a view of the Piton!
There are free bathrooms and a shower available to use on our side of the beach, so we took advantage of that as our time at the beach was nearly done. Promptly at 2pm, our boat returned to pick us up for the final leg of our tour.
Remember how there were 2 different boats at the start of our day, each with people from both of Spencer’s tours? Well, now we had to go back in our original boat. This was a little tricky since the two boats are nearly identical, but we just stayed with our original guides and that worked out okay. The last part of the tour is a tour of St. Lucia from the sea, and the guides made several stops along the way to point out various landmarks and towns.
First, some final views of the famous Pitons
Spencer driving our boat with both Pitons in the background
Speed boat selfie!
This was another really fancy hotel where every room has their own infinity pool! From this angle, I thought it looked more like a parking garage, but I am sure it is very pretty from inside the hotel haha
Notice the fish image on the side of the wall?
Another fancy resort, and it looks like lots of tour boats stop at this beach too
a pirate ship!
Approaching Marigot Bay
The long white building on the left is Doolittle’s Restaurant and Bar
There were some beautiful yachts anchored in this bay
Marigot looks like a fun town with little restaurants and bars all along the bay
We really got an interesting perspective being able to tour the bay from a boat. Spencer took us all the way to the back of the bay, then around the side of this mega-yacht before returning out to the sea
The building with a round shape is George Foreman’s house
Continuing on with the tour, our next stop was at this land formation that kind of looks like a shoe. I had seen this from up on the side of the hill when I toured with Cosol, so it was fun to see it up close from the water this time around.
I don’t remember exactly where we were when this happened, but about 45 minutes into the ride, one of the guys asked Spencer if there is a head on the boat. A minute later, Spencer stopped the boat in a little alcove along the coast and told us it was time for a potty break and that we should jump in the water if needed! All day, Spencer and his crew really a great job of reading the needs of their guests and making sure we were well taken care of. There was plenty of Piton beer, soda, water, and rum punch in the cooler on the boat, and they kept the drinks coming as we continued our tour (just be careful not to drink too much, given the restroom options!).
At 3:15pm, we rounded a corner and saw a welcome sight waiting for us in the distance.
Not that we wanted the tour to end, but it’s always a good feeling to see your cruise ship waiting for you where you left it this morning! Spencer had promised us at the beginning of the tour that we would return back to the pier by 3:30pm at the latest. As promised, he tied up the lines at exactly 3:25pm! All aboard wasn’t until 4:30pm, so we had no need to worry about missing the ship. Overall, we had a fantastic day in St. Lucia with Spencer Ambrose, and I wouldn’t hesitate to book a tour with his company if I ever return here.
After some quick showers and getting dressed for the evening, we went downstairs for a few pre-dinner drinks. DH got a beer from the Gastro Bar and brought it up to join me at the Martini Bar. I started with a Sunset Martini, made with Grey Goose Le Citron flavored vodka, Bacardi Coconut flavored rum, pineapple juice, and grenadine.
For round two, I ordered the Fresca Martini, made with Grey Goose Vodka, fresh watermelon juice, mint, lime juice, and simple syrup. I really liked this cocktail- it was very light and refreshing, and made a perfect end to a day in the hot Caribbean sun!
They have these little jars with something to snack on while we enjoyed our martinis. The only problem is that DH would eat the entire jar and then spoil his appetite for dinner, so be careful with these snacks… they’re addicting!!
A little balancing act while he made someone’s drink
There’s never a dull moment at the Martini Bar!
At 7pm, we went over to the MDR for our dinner reservations, and were happy to hear that there was a table for us in Pinto’s section. Here is tonight’s dinner menu:
Prosciutto di Parma
Spinach Turnover
Homemade Gnocchi al Quattro Formaggi
Butternut Farrotto
We skipped dessert tonight because we had an errand to run. The Captain’s Club host has very limited hours when they are at their desk. It is either mid-morning while we are off the ship in visiting one of the ports, or from 7:15-8:30pm while we are eating dinner. We tried for several days to meet with them, but the timing was never convenient, so finally tonight, we realized our only chance to catch them was to skip dessert. They sit at one of the desks in the mid-ship elevators area of Deck 7. When we got up there, we asked them about changing or expanding their hours, but they said they need to work around the hours of the Elite breakfast and cocktail hour every day. Honestly, I think that was a lame answer because there are lots of Captain’s Club members who have not yet reached Elite status, and we have questions too! There are two of them, so surely it must be possible for one of them to handle the Elite events while the other mans the desk on Deck 7 (even if not every day, maybe they can be flexible and do that every other day?). Or maybe they can have some days when they are at the desk before the cocktail hour, like from 3-5pm? Most people are back on the ship by then considering our all aboard time was 4:30pm every day so far on the cruise, and then it wouldn’t conflict with anyone’s schedules. Ok, sorry, rant over!
DH wanted to check with them about his Captain’s Club points and we had a few other questions for them. I was surprised to learn that now that we are married, we have the same number of points. They said that they make our points match to whoever has more points because we will be sharing a cabin and both get those benefits anyway. It makes sense, I just didn’t think about it before they mentioned it.
Tonight’s show was a solo performer named Sean O’Shea. The description from the daily schedule was very vague and just said he is a man of many voices and personalities, so we had no idea what to expect. After seeing his show, I now understand the vague description because he has a little bit of everything- 1 part singer, 1 part impressionist, 1 part comedian. DH thought he reminded him of if Jim Carey was a singer because he had that kind of humor. He was quite an interesting character, but I honestly can’t say if I enjoyed the show. Maybe it just isn’t my kind of humor?
After the show, we went up to the Sky Lounge for ABBA night, featuring name that tune music trivia followed by an ABBA dance party. The guests on our sailing were big ABBA fans because it was super crowded up there! We stayed for a little while, until the excitement of a busy day got the best of us and we retired back to the cabin.
Step Tracker Daily Total: 4,658 steps; 1.801 miles
*I haven’t really mentioned much about the Cruise Director Eddy. He was very funny and we really enjoyed him as our CD. One of his shticks is that he mispronounced the name of all of our ports. We didn’t really catch on to it at first, so neither of us remembers how he pronounced St. Maarten, but when we heard him say Antigua, we caught on. Part of what made it so funny was that he is from Wales and does have an accent, so between his normal accent and his mispronunciation of these island names, we couldn’t help but chuckle. I’ll include Eddy’s version of the island names for all the rest of our ports. Emphasis is on the capitalized syllable.
Antigua was one of the ports on this itinerary that I was most looking forward to (along with the 3 ABC islands, of course!) because it was the only new port for the first week of the cruise. Antigua is famous for having 365 beaches- one for every day of the year. I briefly considered using today as a beach day, but then decided against it because we were using St. Maarten and Barbados as beach days and I wanted something more adventurous for today. Antigua Adventures receives a 5 star rating on Trip Advisor, and also gets great reviews on Cruise Critic. We decided to book their Eco Tour, which would take us out on a boat for 6 hours, including stops for snorkeling, hiking, a visit to Hell’s Gate Island, and lunch on the beach. They offer a 10% discount if you pay a deposit online with a credit card, so I paid $23.50 per person online and was instructed to pay the remaining $80 per person in cash in US dollars on the day of our tour.
We woke up to an overcast and cloudy sky as we sailed into Antigua this morning. The temperature felt much warmer and more humid than it had been so far this week, so we crossed our fingers that it wouldn’t rain during our tour! We put the room service breakfast tag on our door last night, and it was delivered promptly at 7am. As I had done yesterday, I requested smoked salmon for our bagels, but when I divided up all of our food, there was no plate with salmon. I just assumed they ran out or forgot or whatever, but it wasn’t a big deal. We took our breakfast out onto the balcony to watch as we sailed into port.
Good morning Antigua!
Just as I finished eating, I heard the phone ring inside the cabin. It was the room service manager calling to check up on us and make sure our breakfast was to our liking. I’m not sure if he does this for all the cabins or if it was because we spoke with him last night during dinner, but I thought it was a nice touch. I told him everything was great, but since he called, I asked if it was okay that we were writing in smoked salmon on the order form. I explained that we had ordered it yesterday and it was delivered, but it was not delivered today so I wasn’t sure if we were allowed to order it. He said that was no problem at all to order the smoked salmon, apologized that it was forgotten with today’s order, and offered to send it up to the cabin right away. I told him not to worry about it since we were already finished eating and needed to leave for our tour soon. He told me to make sure to write down any other special requests when I order room service for the rest of the cruise and he would make sure that we got it. I was quite impressed at the level of service and concern for our happiness. Well done, Celebrity!
We packed up our beach bags and headed off the ship at 8:15am to meet our tour group. We were instructed to meet at 8:45am at a boutique located just a 5 minute walk from the cruise ship, but I always like to give us a little extra time just in case we get lost and to make sure we are not late. These guys were playing the steel drums when we got down to the pier.
When we got to the base of the pier, I immediately saw our meeting spot for the tour. The instructions told us to walk across the wood bridge to the Exotic Antigua Boutique, so it was a relief to see a huge sign on their roof labeling the building so I could see it from right next to the cruise ship.
Now that I saw how close we were to the meeting spot, and since we were still a bit early, we walked past the bridge and continued straight towards the shops. I have never been to this port before and I was curious to check out the port area, but I almost immediately regretted my decision. It wasn’t a particularly pretty port area, and honestly it looked a bit run down.
On top of that, the locals were extremely pushy. Every time we took a step down the street, another vendor approached us trying to get us to go into their store to buy something, or to book their tour or get in their taxi and they would take us to the beach. I answered “No thank you, I already have a tour booked” which is usually enough for the vendors to back off, but they still kept pestering us. I felt very uncomfortable and after just a few minutes, I told DH I had enough and we turned back to go wait at our meeting spot for the tour. That didn’t give me the best first impression of Antigua, but I was hopeful that things would improve once we started our tour.
At 8:40am, we spotted our tour boat, clearly labeled with “Antigua Adventures” painted on the side of the boat. There were already a few people on the boat who were staying at a hotel on the island, and the rest of us boarded after they tied up on the dock.
When I booked the tour, they said there was a maximum of 31 people on the tour, but the guides told us there would only be 22 people on our tour today with 3 guides, so there was lots of space to spread out. The boat had a big canopy over the back half of the boat for shade, and it had a lower level with space to store our bags to keep them dry, as well as a bathroom. Once everyone was settled, the guide came around to collect our money to pay for the tour, and we left the dock promptly at 9am.
We spent the first hour of the tour speeding around the island, making occasional stops so the guides could point out the landmarks along the shoreline. The guides also explained some of the history of Antigua.
This was an old navy fort… if you look closely about a quarter of the way in from the left side, you can see one of the canons still perched on the edge of the cliff.
Antigua has some very expensive, high end houses, so the guides pointed it out as we sped past them.
I think this was at one of the hotels
Our tour was called Eli’s Eco Tour, but the tour company Antigua Adventure also offers an Xtreme 360 tour which circumnavigates the entire island in a much faster speed boat. At some point, that boat sped passed us and everyone looked like they were having a great time. I did notice that the boat looked much more crowded than our boat, so I was happy to be on our slower boat with more space to spread out.
Our first longer stop was at Long Island, which I thought was funny because I was born and raised on Long Island in New York. This section of the island has beautiful turquoise water, soft white sand, and lots of very expensive houses. The guides spent a few minutes explaining about how sea turtles lay their eggs on this beach and the island requires the residents here to help facilitate that process and protect the eggs. Something I found really interesting is that the guide told us that the turtles always return to the beach where they were born to lay their eggs. If a turtle was born here, but then swims over to St. Lucia for a few years, it will swim all the way back to this beach to lay it’s eggs. Crazy!
While we were listening to one guide, one of the other guides served us fruit juice or water, but no rum punch just yet- we had to wait for the end of the day after snorkeling before they would serve the good stuff!
We stayed at Long Island for about 20 minutes, then made the 15-minute journey over to the mangroves. When I went through the mangroves in Puerto Rico and Costa Rica, I spotted lots of interesting animals and birds. These mangroves weren’t quite as exciting and we didn’t spot any animals, but maybe they were just deeper inside and not visible from our boat?
Our next stop was at Pelican Island, where we saw tons of pelicans perched up on the hill. There were so many of them, and it was interesting that they all stay close by this one island.
Look closely and you can see lots of pelicans hiding in the bushes.
After leaving Pelican Island, we traveled less than 5 minutes to reach our next destination: Hell’s Gate Island. This was the first time we could get off the boat, and we had the option of snorkeling, swimming in the natural jacuzzi, or going on a hike though a cave and up to the top of the bridge to see the views. The guides explained that we only had about 40 minutes to spend here, so there was only time for us to do one activity. They warned us that the last option was the most adventurous option, so of course that is what we picked to do!
Approaching Hell’s Gate Island
Lots of coral and rocks just below us
That’s the bridge we were climbing up to
As we approached the island, the water was very choppy so I was a bit nervous about swimming over there from the boat. The guides had life vests and pool noodles that we could use to float, so that did make the swimming a little easier, but be careful! There are rocks in the water that come up close to the surface. I was getting tossed around a lot and it was hard to control my direction with the current, and I scrapped my knee on the top of one of the rocks. That scrape is still not fully healed today, over a month later, and I am fairly sure I will end up with a scar on my knee.
Yay! We made it!
The guides were wonderful about helping everyone swim over to the island from the boat. If anyone wasn’t a strong swimmer, the guides were there to help out.
As tough as that swim was, it was totally worth it! The island is really unique. There’s a small patch of soft sand forming a small beach with crystal clear bright blue water washing through the opening in the rocks. That’s the area they referred to as a natural jacuzzi, and I could see it being a lovely place to sit and relax if you don’t want to hike through the cave.
Looking back towards our boat, you can see that the rocks which form the island are very sharp. This natural landform is made of porous limestone rock, and there were lots of sharp jagged edges sticking out. I would definitely recommend wearing water shoes to protect your feet if you are going to take the hike here. We have our own aquasocks, but the guides had little booties for us to borrow if needed.
This photo shows where we entered the cave… do you see the vines hanging down from the top of the bridge? There is a dark opening on the left side towards the bottom of the vines- that’s the cave we walked through.
The guides gave us very specific instructions for how to climb up the rocks, and they pointed out where to turn and how to maneuver safely through the narrow cave opening and up through the middle of the rocks to reach the top.
It was really fun to climb up through the cave, but you need to be careful of your footing and be aware of what is around you. Some parts had a lower ceiling so you had to be careful not to bump your head, and some of the rocks were slippery. I did my best to snap lots of photos, but it wasn’t the greatest lighting conditions in there so I apologize that some of these came out blurry.
The last part was the steepest, but one of the guides stood at the top and told us where to step, and then reached out his hand to help us climb up to the very top.
Looking back down at the water flowing through the middle of the rocks
The views from the top of the island were stunning! It was totally worth the effort to hike up here as we had unobstructed panoramic views of the whole area.
Notice how my hair is blowing all over the place? It was very windy up there so you had to be careful not to lose your footing while gazing out at the views.
When time was almost up, the guides helped us climb across the top of the bridge, and back down to the beach where we started the hike, and then we all swam back to the boat. Hell’s Gate was one of the highlights of this tour. The scenery was amazing and it was such a special experience to see this natural land formation. I was a bit nervous going in because the guides did say it is a challenging hike, but I am so glad I did it and I would highly recommend giving it a try if you take this tour. Yes, it was a little difficult to climb through the narrow spaces, but it was very doable with the help of the guides, and every one of the 15+ people in our group who attempted it was able to complete the hike.
Once everyone was back on the boat, we made another short 5-minute ride to our next stop at Bird Island. The guides mentioned that the islands in Antigua have very simple names (Pelican Island, Bird Island, etc). They pulled the boat into a little alcove with crystal clear aqua blue water and told us it would take them about 15 minutes to set up for lunch so we could do some swimming or walk around on the beach. There was a small boat here when we arrived, but they were just getting ready to leave so we would have the whole island to ourselves.
I liked the name of their boat… Do It Tomorrow
DH decided to go out for a swim
I took a little walk along the beach
This is what happens when I leave DH to hold my camera for a few minutes…
The water was so clear!
Lunch was served buffet style and included pasta salad, BBQ chicken, garden salad, and fried plantains. They also had water, Coke, Coke Zero, beer, and rum punch to drink. All of the food was delicious, and I was very impressed that they served lunch on real plates and with real silverware (ie: not disposable)!
There were a few picnic tables along the beach, and the trees helped provide some shade.
There was more than enough food, and anyone who wanted seconds was welcome to help themselves. When we all had our fill, we cleared our plates and got ready for another little hike along a small trail that climbs up to the top of the hill on Bird Island. Definitely make sure to wear good shoes for this hike. Even though it only takes about 10 minutes to reach the top of the hill, it is steep and slippery in spots so it’s important to have good traction.
This is a map of the island and some of the animals that live here
As expected, the views from the top of the hill were beautiful. We could see the Atlantic Ocean, Caribbean Sea, and many of the islands around Antigua.
I love how this photo came out!
We found a little friend in the bushes
On the way back down the hill, we walked passed another beach on the opposite side of the island
After the hike, we all climbed back on the boat and motored about 5 minutes off the shore of Bird Island to the coral reef to go snorkeling. The guides divided the group into 2 groups- the beginners stayed close to the boat, and the advanced group went out further from the boat with one of the guides. We went with the advanced group and had no trouble keeping up with the guide despite the choppy current. Unfortunately, all of the heavy winds really churned up the water so visibility was limited. We saw lots of rocks and coral, but not many fish. I thought the snorkeling here was okay, but not great.
The guide dove down to the ocean floor and came back with a surprise… a conch shell! This was the first time I have seen one of these while snorkeling!
He handed it to me to get a closer look…
That was the highlight of today’s snorkeling trip! It was also around the spot where we turned around to swim back towards the boat. Swimming out was against the current, so the rest of the time we just floated and let the current gradually drift us back towards the boat.
I was out in the water snorkeling for about 20 minutes. When I got back to the boat, the guides were ready and waiting with a special treat. They served us fresh baked banana bread, water, fruit juice, and very strong rum punch. The rum punch was so strong that I actually asked for a cup with half punch and half fruit juice to dilute it to make it more drinkable haha The snack was much-needed after all that swimming!
After that, we made the 45-minute journey back to the cruise port.
We docked back in front of the Exotic Antigua Boutique at 2:45pm. Overall, I enjoyed the tour and thought the guides did a great job. Antigua is a beautiful island, especially as seen from the water, but I would definitely recommend doing some research and picking a tour in advance. The locals at the port are incredibly pushy and I would not recommend trying to book a tour right there when you arrive, nor would I recommend spending too much time walking around the port area. Our itinerary had many islands that are better for shopping where you don’t have to deal with the pushy locals. Sorry Antigua, but you were not my favorite island of this cruise.
We thanked our guides and went straight back to the ship, happy to find our afternoon cheese plate waiting for us in the cabin.
Yay! We finally got real crackers instead of saltines! Call me crazy, but it really did make the cheese taste better. After some quick showers, we headed down to the Gastro Bar because DH wanted to try some new beers (and we kind of needed a break from the Martini Bar lol) DH had a beer and I tried some champagne.
We could see a beautiful sunset through the windows, so we went up to the outside deck on deck 5 to get a better look. This is what cruising is all about!
Such a perfect night to lounge on an outside deck, watching the sun set over the ocean with some drinks.
At 7pm, we went down to the MDR for dinner. Here is tonight’s menu:
My favorite treat on cruises is escargot. I never eat this any other time besides on a cruise, so I love that Celebrity offers it as an every day appetizer. I ordered this many times over our 2 week cruise, but I’ll only post the photo this one time.
Spiced Duck Rillettes
Celebrity Signature Crab Cake
Penne Primavera
Oven Roasted Chicken Saltimbocca (this was the only dish from the entire cruise which I thought was a miss… it just wasn’t what I expected and I didn’t really enjoy it. We had planned to share the penne but I ended up eating most of it on my own.)
Dessert Menu
I don’t have a photo of the dessert but I am fairly certain that I ordered the Apple Tart. After dinner, we went upstairs to watch a few minutes of the evening hot glass show. We never got to do this on our 2016 cruise, but I really liked seeing the shows at night. The hot glass seems to glow brighter at night, and it was much cooler watching the show in the evening air instead of in the daytime sun. We only had a few minutes to watch the show because we needed to get to the main theater by 9pm, but it was worth it to see them make one piece.
Tonight’s featured performer was Savannah Smith, backed by the Eclipse Orchestra. She is a singer and performer in Las Vegas and she put on a wonderful, entertaining show. She sings songs by the famous female divas, and her voice is very strong. We really enjoyed it.
After the show, we went straight back to the cabin, tired from a busy day in Antigua but looking forward to tomorrow in St. Lucia!
Our absolute favorite part of our snorkeling tour in St. Maarten in 2015 was the 20 minutes we spent at Pinel Island. Everything there was so beautiful… the soft white sand, the bright blue water, the views looking back at the main island. At the time, we wished we could have spent more time there, and we always said we wanted to return the next time we had a port stop in St. Maarten. A year later, we booked this cruise, and when we saw our first port of call on this itinerary, it didn’t take long to decide our plans for the day. There is a company called Caribbean Paddling who has a tour that provides round trip transportation to their office, and then you rent a tandem kayak for the day and can take it over to Pinel Island, all for $80 total ($40 per person). It sounded like a fun activity to make it more than just a beach day, and I was planning to wait until a few months before the cruise to book our reservation on their website.
Unfortunately, the rough hurricane season in the fall of 2017 put a kink in our plans. St. Maarten suffered devastating damage, so much so that cruise ships could not visit the island for several months. I decided to hold off on booking anything specific for our port stop here as I did not know for sure if we were going to St. Maarten or if we would have an itinerary change at the last minute. I was diligent about checking Cruise Critic as people reported back their experiences as the first few ships docked in St. Maarten, and the overall consensus was that the Dutch side of the island was recovering much faster than the French side. Since Pinel Island is on the French side of the island, and I knew they suffered major damage in the hurricane, I decided to postpone our return visit for a future cruise (I am sure we will return here again eventually!), and I started to research options closer to the cruise port area. In the end, we decided our best option would be to not book any specific tours. Instead, we decided to spend the day checking out the beach and boardwalk in Phillipsburg, renting an umbrella and lounge chairs for a relaxing day at the beach, and possibly going for lunch at one of the restaurants nearby.
Today’s daily schedule:
I woke up this morning around 7am, with just a few minutes to get dressed before room service delivered our breakfast. After re-plating all of the dishes onto our own individual plates, we brought our breakfast outside to the balcony to admire the beautiful views of the bay. This is definitely my favorite part of having a balcony cabin!
Side note: The breakfast menu offers a choice of onion or plain bagels. We ordered 1 onion bagel for each of us. When we opened the basket of breads and pastries, we found 2 bagels, neither of which had any onions on them! At the time, we assumed they must have run out of onion bagels and just gave us plain instead… okay, not a big deal. But then the same thing happened again tomorrow, and the next day. Ok, so let’s try a new tactic- one day we decided to order 1 plain bagel and 1 onion bagel as an experiment. We definitely received 2 different kinds of bagels with our delivery, but neither one had any onions haha One was the same size as the bagels we had been getting, and the other was quite a bit smaller, like a mini-bagel. We came to the conclusion that “onion” really means “large” bagel, and “plain” means “small” bagel. And to clarify, even the “large onion” bagel isn’t very large… it’s fairly thin and airy (not dense), so we had no trouble finishing the bagel with lox and cream cheese and the omelet, and even had room for a pastry for dessert. If you like big, filling breakfasts (as we do when we will be out on a tour in port for several hours and won’t be able to eat lunch until mid-afternoon), then order accordingly!
Looking out over the railing of our balcony to the far right, we could see the beach where we will spend our day. I am used to traveling quite far from the port area, so this would be a first for me- relaxing on a beach so close to where the cruise ship is docked.
The sun was shining bright and it looked like a beautiful start to our day in St. Maarten! At 8am, they made the announcement that the ship was cleared, so we packed up our bags and went down to deck 2 to get off the ship.
It has been 3 years since we were last here so it was hard to remember the specifics of the cruise village to know how many buildings were destroyed by Hurricane Irma. I did notice a few buildings under construction, plus a bit of debris tossed to the side, but for the most part, most of the stores were open and looked like they were in good shape.
We followed the signs for the 5-minute walk from the ship to the water taxi booth to buy our tickets.
At some point yesterday, DH picked up a coupon for $1 off the water taxi. He said they were handing it out somewhere on the ship but couldn’t remember exactly where he got it.
As it turned out, the lady selling water taxi tickets did not need the coupon to honor the price. As we approached the booth, she said it would be $6 USD per person for unlimited rides all day. Does anyone pay $5 for a one way ride?? That is not a good deal at all!! The lady handed us each a wrist band and directed us to walk between the buildings, out to the water, then to turn left and walk down to the pier to board the water taxi. It took us about 5 minutes to reach the water taxi, and luckily, it was just about ready to leave as we boarded. Once we left the dock, the crew on the taxi announced that they were selling bottles of water and cans of soda for $1, and cans of beer for $2.
While I know the walk from the cruise ship to downtown Phillipsburg only takes about 20 minutes, and we had at least 10 minutes of walking to get to the water taxi, it was still worth it for the beautiful views as we sped across the bay.
Some of the boats that were destroyed in the hurricane are piled up on the shore
Approaching Bobby’s marina
Lots of lounge chairs and umbrellas set up along the beach, ready for hoards of cruise passengers to arrive
I thought that each water taxi made 3 stops at the piers along the beach, so I planned to get off at the second or third stop. When we got to Bobby’s Marina, the driver said that everyone had to get off and he was not going to the other piers. As it turned out, each boat only went to 1 pier and then returned to the cruise port, but there was no way to know which pier they were going to because they just said they were going “to town”. The entire taxi ride took exactly 5 minutes, so honestly, I don’t think it saved us much time over walking the whole way, but like I said, it was worth it for the views.
We got off the taxi and as soon as we started walking towards the beach, someone approached us to ask if we needed beach chairs. He offered us 2 chairs and a shared umbrella for $20. The loungers he pointed out to us did not have any padding, so we said “No, thank you” and kept walking down the beach for a better option.
The next guy we saw had loungers with thick yellow cushions that looked very comfortable. He offered us 2 chairs, a small table, 1 umbrella, free wifi, and changing rooms for $15, plus we could buy a bucket of 5 beers for an additional $10. We tried to negotiate unsuccessfully, so we agreed and picked 2 loungers in the front row along the water. It was barely 9am so very few people had arrived yet, and we had the beach to ourselves!
Notice how all of the cushions are flopping over? It was another windy day in the Caribbean!
Looking back towards the boardwalk… throughout the day, the guys continued to set up more loungers behind ours
I really liked that they put the umbrellas close together so there was lots of shade on the lounge chairs for most of the day (…until the sun moved over the bay and then there was no way to avoid it!)
Soft white sand, turquoise water, views of the cruise ships and the island of Saba in the distance… what more could I ask for? (It also helped that there was a major blizzard in the Northeast today, so when I posted this photo on my social media, I made a lot of people very jealous haha)
Be careful where you step… there were a lot of small shells washed up along the shoreline
Good morning from St. Maarten!
It was so relaxing to sit on my lounge chair, take notes in my journal, and listen to the waves roll in against the shore.
We had the beach mostly to ourselves until around 10am when a cruise ship excursion took over the chairs in the next section over from ours. At that point, there was a DJ who started playing somewhat loud music, and lots of people started splashing around in the bay. It didn’t really bother me, but it was noticeable that our quiet beach morning was turning into a more vibrant and lively scene. With our prime front row seats, at least we could do some great people watching!
At around noon, we started getting hungry for lunch. We considered eating at one of the restaurants along the boardwalk, but ultimately decided to make use of our unlimited water taxi rides and to head back to the ship for lunch at the buffet. The guy who rented us the chairs said it was no problem to leave for a few hours for lunch, and he would hold our chairs for us. We left behind a few less valuable things (sunscreen, water bottles, and books) to hold our chairs, and took our now-much-lighter beach bags with us as we walked back to the water taxi dock. When we got to the dock, someone told us we missed the last taxi by 5 minutes, so we sat in the gazebo to wait for the next one which arrived about 10 minutes later.
Note that all the seats are protected from the sun… something I always appreciate!
This was the gazebo where we waited for the taxi… again, in the shade!
Our chairs were in the section of blue umbrellas. This also shows some of the damage to the hotel behind the section of red umbrellas. There was lots of construction going on the whole time we were there.
Almost back to the dock at the cruise port
This beautiful yacht was docked next to where the water taxis left from. I would love to travel around St. Maarten on a yacht like that someday!!
In all, it took us 45 minutes to get from our loungers at the beach to get back on the ship. I had thought we could do the entire journey round trip, including eating lunch, in about an hour, but obviously that was not possible! We went straight up to the buffet for lunch, where the theme of the day was A Taste of France. I didn’t see anything at the specialty stations which appealed to me, so instead, I went to the made-to-order pasta station. I love that they have so many fresh ingredients and you can pick as many as you want, including proteins, and then a few different sauce options which change day to day.
Bowtie pasta with mushrooms, onions, sun-dried tomatoes, zucchini, garlic, chicken, and tomato sauce, with a side of spinach and goat cheese pizza. Don’t forget to take some parmesan cheese before leaving the station like I did! Oops!
I took a chocolate chip cookie for dessert as we left the buffet, and by 1:15pm, we were on our way back to the beach. This time, when we got to the water taxi dock, the water taxi was already there but they said they were taking a lunch break and directed us to a larger ferry further along the pier. I asked the driver if he was going to the marina and he said yes, so we got on. It took about 5 minutes for them to fill up the rest of the boat since this one was much larger than the boat we had taken this morning, and then they left. A few minutes into the ride, I noticed we were very far out into the middle of the bay and not aiming for the marina. He ended up docking all the way at the opposite end of the beach from our lounge chairs! It was really annoying that he gave us wrong information, but it didn’t really matter because I wanted to take a walk along the boardwalk anyway, so we just did it now instead of later in the day (and we only had to walk in 1 direction in the heat, so maybe it was a win after all!).
This was the larger water taxi we used for this leg of the trip
Nice views of the beach from the water taxi pier
I did notice signs down that way offering chairs/umbrellas/beer deals for $20 total, but it wouldn’t be worth it for us to walk that far from where the original water taxi dropped us off. Plus, now that it was 1:30pm, it was possible that the prices were lower than they were at 9am since you wouldn’t have as much time to enjoy your lounger.
More construction, but it is all contained to the boundaries of the building and did not disrupt people walking on the boardwalk
When we arrived back at our lounge chairs, our belongings were still waiting for us, right where we left them. The beach was definitely more crowded now and lots of people were swimming in the water. I am not sure if it is always like this, or if the water was rougher today with all of the wind, but there was a strong current and small waves as the water reached the shoreline. We watched as many people got knocked over by the waves. They would be out in the water but facing the beach to talk to someone on the sand, so the waves snuck up behind them and knocked them down. I guess it would have been nice for their friends/family to warn them the wave was coming! Haha
We relaxed on our loungers for the next hour and a half, and at 3:30pm, we packed up and walked back to the water taxi dock. It was nice being so close to the ship all day, and being able to stay at the beach a little longer than if we had a further distance to travel back to the ship. I don’t normally stay out until 1 hour before all aboard time, but we figured we were safe, knowing that we could always walk back to the ship in 20 minutes if a water taxi never showed up. There was nothing to worry about though, as the water taxi arrived 5 minutes after we got to the dock. There was a big line of people waiting to get on, but there were enough seats for everyone, with space to spare. Those taxis are bigger than they appear! We walked the 10 minutes or so back to the Eclipse and got onboard by 4pm.
Not quite ready to end our day, we went straight upstairs to the Sunset Bar for a few drinks and to watch the sail away. We found 2 open seats right at the railing, so we had a beautiful view to relax and look out over the port and the bay.
Amazingly, DH was able to get a signal from the wifi back at the beach while we were sitting out there! I’m really not sure how that was possible considering we weren’t THAT close, and I was not as lucky and couldn’t get my phone to connect, but he took advantage and checked his social media one last time.
The flag was blowing in the breeze. Kind of cool that we could see the ocean out in the distance beyond the cruise port and the town. I also love that the walkways in the cruise village look like a giant checkerboard. It is hard to notice that when you are on ground level, but very obvious when looking down from the top deck of the ship!
Not many people on their aft balconies right now
We didn’t notice any pier runners, but it was kind of hard to know for sure because we were docked next to the Freedom of the Seas and they had a later all aboard time than us.
A little after 5pm, we saw the crew bringing in the lines, and then we felt the ship start to drift away from the pier. The views from up here were so wonderful, and we knew we would spend quite a few sail always at the Sunset Bar.
Until next time, St. Maarten!
Freedom of the Seas is still tied up at the pier for another hour or so
I never noticed this before, but they must bring in the flag after leaving port each evening, and then put it back out the next morning after docking.
Peek-a-boo! I see you! I’m not sure I understand the appeal of an aft balcony on the S-class ships when the sloped angle gives them very little privacy (and likely very limited shade when the sun is overhead!) I get that people love to watch the wake, but personally, I prefer shade and privacy when I’m on my balcony!
One last photo…
It was now around 5:30pm, so we ran back to the cabin for some quick showers and to get ready for the evening. The sunset views from our cabin were stunning!
We also had a very clear view of Saba in the distance
We went down to the Martini Bar for a quick drink before dinner. I ordered the Candied Apple Martini, made with Grey Goose Vodka, apple schnapps, pomegranate juice, and butterscotch schnapps, but I think they added too much butterscotch.
I’m not sure what DH ordered (likely a gin martini) but he managed to knock over his glass and it broke!
We let the bartenders know right away, but I guess they were too busy with the pre-dinner rush because it took them a surprisingly long time to come clean it up. We weren’t in a rush per se, but there was broken glass on the table and we thought they would have been eager to clean it up before someone got hurt. When someone did come over, he was extremely thorough and even checked to make sure there wasn’t any glass in the stack of clean glasses that had just come out of the dishwasher and was sitting right on the other side of the counter. Luckily, it was all clear (pun intended) and the glass broke in fairly large pieces so it was easy to clean up!
We hung around at the Martini Bar long enough to catch some flair, then headed off to take our nightly pre-dinner photo.
When we arrived at the hostess stand for the MDR, Cervine told us there would be a short wait for Pinto’s section tonight. Waiting just a few minutes was well worth it for us to be seated with our favorite wait staff, and as an added bonus, we got a window seat! I love when we get to sit next to the window because the window sill is about 18 inches deep and gives us lots of extra space to spread out. I can keep my purse and camera there, and we also move the bread basket and butter tray over there when we need more space on our small table for the many appetizers and entrees we like to order. In theory, the windows should provide a nice view of the ocean or maybe even the sunset, but the windows were always too foggy and dirty to provide a good view, and halfway through our meal it was dark outside anyway.
Tonight’s dinner menu
Duck Terrine
We had a bit of a snafu at dinner tonight. DH and I each ordered one appetizer and the French Onion Soup. Perhaps it was because we were not eating in their section last night and they forgot, but Jose did not deliver all of our appetizers at the same time. This might have been okay, but for whatever reason, he chose to deliver my Duck Terrine at the same time as DH’s soup. I don’t know if you have ever ordered the French Onion Soup on a Celebrity Cruise (it’s delicious btw!!), but it takes a very long time to eat it. The melted cheese on top and the bowl they serve it in help to keep the soup piping hot, and it can be a little challenging to cut through the cheese and piece of bread, so it takes a while to finish it. Had they brought both of our soups at the same time, it would have been fine, but I finished my duck fairly quickly and then DH felt rushed to finish his soup so they could bring out our second round of appetizers. It wasn’t a huge deal, and certainly not something we wanted to complain about, but it was just not how we like things done. We also thought it was just kind of weird because it would have made more sense to serve the soup course at the same time to both guests at the table.
Right around that time, the room service manager stopped by our table to check on us and ask how our meal was going. We hesitated to tell him what happened but he could tell something was wrong and he really pressed us to talk to him about it. We really liked Pinto and Jose and we did not want them to get in trouble in any way, but the manager really wanted to hear our thoughts, so we told him what happened. After we spoke up, there was an immediate change in service, and Pinto and Jose were overly attentive for the rest of the meal.
French Onion Soup
Turkey Parmesan
Seared Branzino
Slow Braised Lamb Wrapped in Phyllo
Dessert Menu
I was too full to order dessert, but DH ordered the cheese plate. If any of you have read my Paul Gauguin review, you know about my husband’s love affair with a cheese plate after dinner lol This wasn’t anything like what they did on Paul Gauguin with a rolling cart brought to our table, but that was probably a good thing for the sake of portion control! DH was very happy to receive real crackers instead of saltines (and this was proof that there are, in fact, other crackers on the ship besides saltines!!)
After dinner, we walked around the ship for a bit to work off some of the calories, then we made our way to the theater. Tonight’s show was called Rock City and featured the singers, dancers, and aerialists performing songs by The Who, Bon Jovi, Green Day, and many more. It was more like a rock concert than a show in that it did not have a plot, and of course, we really enjoyed it. This seemed like Celebrity’s effort to cater to a younger audience, which was okay with me since I like this kind of music, but I am not sure how the older crowd felt about it.
At 10pm, the activities crew was hosting an 80’s themed game up in the Sky Lounge. The description in the daily schedule was quite vague, but we wanted to check it out. They divided the room into 2 groups based on where you were sitting, and asked for a team leader from each side. We were sitting in the front row so they asked DH to be our leader, and Mike (traveling-2) volunteered for the other team. The game was name that tune with 80’s songs and you had to know the title and the artist. People from the audience were supposed to run up and tell the team leader the answer and he would then tell it to the host to get the points. As it turned out, DH and Mike are both quite knowledgeable in 80’s music and they knew almost every answer without any help. They recognized the songs after only a few notes, so the rest of us in the audience didn’t have time to run up and answer anyway! Notice the activities staff member standing in the middle? That’s Flory, and he had his hand held out for DH or Mike to tap him when they knew the answer. You can imagine how poor Flory got stuck in the middle as DH and Mike both rush over to him at the same time! The poor guy seemed scared to stand there after the first few songs haha
In the end, it was a pretty even match up but I think Mike’s team ended up winning. I just want to take a moment here to talk about Flory… This event was held on the third night of our cruise, and from this moment on, any time Flory saw us, he made sure to say hi. When DH first went up onto the dance floor, Flory asked where he lives. When DH said San Jose, CA, Flory immediately responded “Go Sharks!” He is a big hockey fan and apparently knows all the teams, and he was very excited that we live in the city of one of the teams he likes. If Flory spotted us from across the room, or the buffet, or the pool deck, or anywhere really, he would yell “Go Sharks!”, so it wasn’t just that he was saying hi to a familiar face. We knew he remembered exactly who we were, which was quite impressive considering how many guests are on the ship and that he interacts with a new set of guests every 2 weeks. He always had a smile on his face and so much energy in every event that he hosted, and we just thought he was wonderful at his job (and definitely made a point to mention that in our guest satisfaction survey after the cruise!).
Back to Wednesday night… The house band was scheduled to perform poolside at 10:15pm so we went over to check it out, thinking maybe there would be a party vibe on the pool deck. No such luck! It seemed totally dead and there was hardly anyone out there, so we just went back to the cabin and called it a night.
Last night was the one and only time we changed our clocks on this cruise. It was nice that Captain Leo waited until the second sea day to spring our clocks ahead one hour to match the time zone in the Caribbean so we didn’t lose an hour of sleep on the very first night of the cruise. Daylight savings time occurred on the sea day mid-way through our itinerary when we were sailing from Barbados to Bonaire, so that put us back on track with the Miami time zone and saved us the need to change our clocks at the end of the cruise. Before going to sleep last night, we put the breakfast room service door tag out and requested an 8:30-9am delivery time with hopes of sleeping in a little bit, but also to test out the process. We like to eat breakfast on our balcony each port day to avoid the chaos at the buffet, so this was a good chance to test it out and see how things go before tomorrow when we will arrive at our first port of call. This is the breakfast room service menu for Concierge (and Aqua) class cabins.
Despite my best efforts to sleep late, I woke up at 7am and the ship was rocking so much that I couldn’t fall back asleep. I got up and sat outside on the balcony and took notes in my trip journal and let DH sleep a little longer. It looked like there was a beautiful sunrise but we couldn’t see the sun directly on the starboard side this morning (I’ll bet early risers with port-side cabins had a great view though!)
At 8:25am, the cabin phone rang with a heads up that our breakfast was on the way. I have a feeling a lot of people use breakfast room service as a wake up call, so it’s a nice touch that they call on the phone first to give you a minute to open your eyes and put on some clothes or a robe or something before they come knocking on the door. The food arrived promptly at 8:30am, and everything was hot and exactly as we ordered, including my special request for smoked salmon! We ordered some orange juice with our breakfast- the menu has premium and regular OJ and we ordered one of each, but could not tell which was which! I have a feeling one is fresh squeezed (presumably the premium OJ), so we ordered that for the rest of the cruise, but like I said, I really couldn’t tell the difference from the regular juice.
Instead of taking the whole stack of plates outside, I like to divide up our food inside and then we can just take one plate outside for each of us.
My breakfast (before adding cream cheese and salmon to the bagel)
DH’s breakfast
We popped open the bottle of champagne from embarkation day (another Concierge class perk), and made some mimosas to go with our breakfast.
We stayed out on the balcony until around 10:30am, and then relocated to the solarium. It was another windy and cool day, so it was nice to hang out in the solarium which is a bit warmer than out by the pool. We noticed many chairs were occupied by towels and books, but not as many as yesterday by the pool. Luckily, there were 2 loungers available but they were in the middle of the row so we had to crawl up onto them. Why must they set up the seats so close together?! It gets so awkward to climb in and out of your seat, and I can only imagine how challenging this is for anyone with mobility issues.
Sorry for the terrible lighting in this photo! The section where we were sitting was right near the door to the elevators and the spa where the ceiling is a solid tarp and much dimmer than under the glass ceiling in the main seating area.
The Slush Bar is located right next to the Pool Bar on deck 12 and offers fancier versions of the standard boozy slushy drinks. These drinks take a few minutes to make, and there is only one bartender stationed at this bar, so it can take a while to get your drink, especially if there is a line before you get there. The bar is only opened from noon until 4pm, so we made sure to be there right when they opened to avoid a long wait. Here is the menu (sorry for the glare!), and the drinks are included with the premium beverage package.
Side note (because I took this photo while we were waiting for the bartender to make our drinks): This is a photo of our sea pass cards. Since we had the classic alcohol package when we boarded the ship, there is a code “CALL” preprinted at the bottom of the card. When we paid for our upgrades to the premium package, they added the “PALL” sticker. If your sticker falls off (or if you take your seapass card in the ocean/pool and it wears away), you can go to guest services and they will print you a new card with PALL printed on it. Notice the bottom left corner of the card where it says “068”. The seapass cards all list the last 3 digits of your cabin number, but not the first digit which is for the deck. I think Celebrity started doing this because people forgot their cabin numbers and kept going to guest services to ask, but I’m not so sure this was the best solution. If I lost my seapass card and someone found it, they could go to every deck and try to open the door for the cabins ending in 068… with only 7 decks on the ship with cabin numbers ending in 068, it wouldn’t take long for that person to find my cabin. Just a thought!
DH ordered the Golden Coconut (a gourmet frozen pina colada), and I had the Spiked Razz Slush. We both enjoyed our drinks, but honestly couldn’t taste much difference from a regular pina colada or daiquiri at the pool bar so we only returned here one or two more times during the cruise.
Back in 2016, the Slush Bar served drinks in disposable to-go cups, similar to what Starbucks uses for their frapuccinos. We thought those cups were fun, and were disappointed to see that the Eclipse just uses the same tall hard plastic cups that they use at all the outdoor bars for frozen drinks. I guess Celebrity decided it was better to use cups that were washable instead of wasting the disposable ones. I can’t really blame them… it’s not like we can really take these drinks too far considering they aren’t allowed off the ship!
We took our drinks back to our loungers in the Solarium and relaxed there for a little while until we started to get hungry for lunch. One corner of the Solarium houses the Aqua Spa Café, which serves lighter and healthier options for breakfast and lunch. Despite the name, this spot is not restricted to people staying in Aqua Class cabins. Anyone can eat here as long as they are over age 16 (because that is the restriction for being inside the Solarium). The food was pre-plated and served buffet style, and there is a juice bar where they will make smoothies and juices both off the menu and made-to-order. I don’t think I ever took a photo of the lunch menu (oops!), but here is the breakfast menu (taken later in the cruise, but it was the same for the whole cruise so I may as well post it now!)
These are the food options for lunch…
Fresh fruit, no idea what the white thing is- maybe yogurt??, turkey and tomato wrap
Beet salad, Caprese salad, bowtie pasta with pesto
The end of the line had a few other salads like tuna, chicken, and salmon salad.
There were also some breadsticks and a biscuit/scone type thing but I didn’t try any of these
I opted for the bowtie pesto pasta salad and the salmon salad and brought the little plates back to our loungers so I could share them with DH. Both were light and tasty, and they made for a good pre-lunch snack.
Of course, we can’t resist checking out what they had upstairs at the Oceanview buffet, so we took turns going up there to get a few more things to eat. Today’s theme was A Taste of Italy and featured a fresh mozzarella station with pesto and a few kinds of tomatoes. There was also several kinds of lasagna (DH loved the beef lasagna), meatballs, and other pasta dishes. I ended up with a slice of pizza topped with shrimp (not a combination I’ve ever tried before but it was bizarrely tasty), pasta salad, seafood salad, fresh mozzarella with pesto, and of course, a piece of that yummy chocolate fudge cake.
We ate our lunches on our loungers in the Solarium, then relaxed there for a few more hours until 3pm, when we went upstairs to the Sky Lounge for music trivia. This was actually the start of a tradition for us, and we attended many of the 3pm music trivia sessions in the Sky Lounge throughout the cruise. It was offered every day, regardless of if it was a port day or a sea day, and there was a core group of about 50 people who seemed to show up every day just like us! At first, DH and I played on a team of just the 2 of us, and while we did respectably, we knew we wouldn’t ever win without more man power. At some point later in the cruise, we teamed up with a couple of baby boomers and realized the secret to music trivia success: form a multi-generational team!! DH and I knew all the songs from the late 70’s through today, and the baby boomers knew all the songs from before then. We were allowed to have teams of up to 6 people, so this made it more fun and gave us better odds at winning. No spoilers just yet to see if we ever did win a trivia game!
Today’s trivia theme was Broadway Music Trivia. They played 15 songs and we just had to guess the name of the show, not the song name. DH and I have had a subscription to see the traveling Broadway shows that come to San Jose for the last 4 seasons (and we’re already signed up for the 2018-2019 season!), and I have seen over 50 Broadway shows from when I lived in New York, so we thought we had good odds with this theme. In the end, we only got 10 out of 15 correct, and the winning team got 14 right. Every day, at 3:30pm, they went right into general knowledge trivia which is not one of our fortes, so that was our cue to head back to the cabin and get changed for the evening.
When we got back to our cabin, our cheese tray was waiting for us, as was the disembarkation questionnaire. Today was day 3 of a 14 day cruise, so I thought it was a bit soon to be talking about disembarkation, but I assumed it was to give us priority on our preferred time slots before they asked the rest of the ship for their forms (or maybe everyone got their forms today, I really don’t know for sure).
We went down to the Martini Bar at 4:45pm and all the seats around the bar were taken. One of the ladies sitting there said we needed to arrive by 4pm to get a seat, but that is way too early if you ask me! We would never be ready by then on a port day, and even if we were, we don’t need 3 hours of drinks before our 7pm dinner reservations (at least not if we want to enjoy our dinner at all!!). Luckily, someone got up a minute later so we could take a seat, and one of the bartenders quickly took our order. I always love when they pour multiple drinks at the same time!
I ordered a Sunset Martini, made with Grey Goose Le Citron vodka, Bacardi Coconut rum, pineapple juice, and grenadine.
A few minutes later, I noticed another bartender, Ketut, getting ready to put on a show by the Crush Bar, so I went over to check it out. Ketut was my favorite bartender at the Martini Bar and we always tried to order from him because we thought he was the liveliest and had the best flair of the group. I am always so impressed that they can get the drinks into the correct glass without spilling!
BTW, this was a great use for the burst mode on my camera haha Back at my seat at the bar, I was ready for round 2, so I ordered the Blue Wave Martini with Bombay Sapphire gin, peach schnapps, blue curacao, and lime juice.
One really fun feature of the Martini Bar is that the surface where you place your drinks is covered with a thin layer of ice. Make sure to always put your martini glass on a napkin or else it will stick to the ice and you may spill it when you try to pick it up! DH found great amusement in drawing pictures in the ice while he sipped his drink. Here is today’s creation… a thirsty shark!
It’s so great that the Martini Bar is located just above the Grand Foyer so we can listen to the band performing downstairs while we enjoy our cocktails. They are very talented and always played a great set!
After 2 drinks, we were ready to move along, but it was still too early for dinner. Time for an impromptu photo shoot around the ship!
Those large pieces of art back near the specialty restaurants on deck 5 make for a great photo background. On the way, we passed through the Ensemble Lounge, so we took at seat at the bar to try out a drink or two. Unfortunately for us, we arrived right at 6pm and the bartender was extremely busy. Not only does she make drinks for people sitting at the bar, but also for those sitting at the little tables around the lounge who order drinks from the bar waitress (who only takes drink orders but does not actually make any drinks), as well as drink orders from the specialty restaurants! This is one very busy bartender and I was surprised she had to handle all of that by herself. My guess is that service is a lot faster if you arrive here outside of dinner hours, but we rarely came back here so I don’t know for sure. When we got her attention, I ordered a Kir Royale and I think DH had a beer.
A few minutes before 7pm, we made our way over to the dining room. We requested to sit in Pinto’s section again, and the hostess said it was no problem, but for some reason, when we arrived at the table they wanted to seat us at, there was another couple sitting there. The lady who escorted us to the table looked very confused, but just sat us at the next open table, which was unfortunately not in Pinto’s section. At the time, we didn’t know what happened and why they assigned us to a table that was occupied, but towards the end of the cruise, we figured it out. There was another couple who we saw escort themselves to their table. They started to sit down and were saying that they like their waiter, Peter, but they were sitting at a table in Pinto’s section. Peter and Pinto have sections right next to each other, and I think this couple was confused and sat themselves at the wrong table, which was then assigned to us because the hostess didn’t know these people were sitting there. Tonight, we sat at table 546, but we were assigned to table 545, and I have a hunch this couple just sat at the wrong table but meant to sit at 546.
The reason this was such a problem was that Peter and Erick were very slow as a wait team and our meal took an hour and 45 minutes, start to finish. That was way too slow for our liking, so we talked to the hostess on the way out in hopes of getting back in Pinto’s section tomorrow. She was a bit confused as to why we weren’t in his section tonight, but assured us she would do her best to seat us with Pinto tomorrow if there were tables available.
But let’s not get too far ahead of ourselves. Here is tonight’s dinner menu:
Barolo Braised Beef Ragout
Sesame Crusted Tuna Carpaccio
Mediterranean Seafood Orzo
Lemon-Pepper Roasted Chicken
Roasted Beef Flank Steak
Dessert Menu
Apple Pie (minus the ‘a la mode’) from the classic menu
We left the dining room at 8:45pm, and hurried over to the World Class Bar to pick up a drink to bring to the theater for the show. I tried the Celebrity No. Ten and really enjoyed it. It was light and refreshing, and was conveniently served in an easy-to-carry glass haha
Tonight’s show was a comedian named Dan Grueter, and the daily schedule described his jokes as quick and clean. I do not usually like when comedians resort to profanity and dirty jokes to get a laugh, so I was hopeful for these “clean” jokes. He was very funny, but he did not have a pre-written routine. Instead, he talked to people in the first few rows of the audience and made jokes about them. I must have been very tired from all of the relaxing we did today because I nodded off towards the end of his show. Luckily, we were sitting at the back of the room and he didn’t see me!
When the show ended, I went back to the cabin to pack up our bags for our first port day, while DH went to the atrium to listen to Hard Days Night. I was fast asleep by the time he returned to the cabin, but he later told me the band was a lot of fun and I missed a good set. I guess you can’t do everything on a cruise, and I needed my beauty sleep before arriving in St. Maarten tomorrow.
*So yea, I think it’s highly unlikely that I walked up 113 flights of stairs in one day haha More likely, the strong winds that persisted all day today caused the ship to rock up and down, and I spent most of the day towards the forward end of the ship (in the Solarium and the Sky Lounge), and that end of the ship felt more movement than had I been mid-ship. Very weird, but at least this was the last day I experienced glitches like that on my Fitbit.
After going to sleep at 10:30pm last night, it was no surprise that we woke up bright and early at 8am today. Stepping out onto the balcony, we were confronted with cloudy skies and strong gusts of wind.
By the way, when we switched to this cabin, I wasn’t sure how I would feel about the diagonal support beams on the side of the balcony and the extra overhang from 2 decks above. Honestly, I am not a fan of the diagonal support beams… they make it hard to take a good photo looking forward of aft from the balcony (and we all know I measure happiness in a location based on if I can take a good photo there haha). Obviously these beams must be needed to support the upper decks, but I just wish they didn’t impact the view from our balcony. On the bright side, I really liked having the extra overhang 2 decks above us. I may not have liked it as much if I were up one deck on deck 11 where the extended roof was immediately above me, but being on deck 10 meant I had a little extra shade without much impact on my view. In fact, if I looked straight out to the horizon, I didn’t notice the overhang at all.
If you look really closely at the horizon, you can see land… that’s Cuba. We could see Cuba in the distance pretty much the entire day. We hardly watched TV in our cabin during the cruise, but we frequently checked channels 5 and 6 for the navigation map and the bridge view. It was always fun to check in on where we were in the Caribbean!
Our first stop of the day was downstairs to Café al Bacio so DH could get some good coffee. While he placed his order, I salivated over the offerings in the pastry case. These are all complimentary, even if you don’t order a drink here, but I wanted to save my appetite for breakfast. At some point later in the morning, they remove these pastries and replace them with fancy cakes (also complimentary).
Another nice feature of Café al Bacio is that they serve the drinks in to go cups, so DH took his coffee to go and we went upstairs to get breakfast at the buffet. As expected, it was very crowded with people walking in every direction, not yet knowing their way around the buffet. I took a random assortment of carbs, knowing that I tend to eat eggs every port day morning and using today as a chance to try the other options. I love that they offer smoked salmon and try to take advantage of that frequently, and I really liked the baked apple, but the French toast and the waffle were just okay.
After breakfast, we strolled around the ship until it was time for the Cruise Critic meet and greet in the Sky Lounge at 9:45am. Originally when we first looked through the papers in our cabin yesterday, we had an invitation for the meet and greet at 10:15am in Cellar Masters, but when we got back to the cabin later last night, we had a revised invitation and a message on the phone that the event was moved up to the Sky Lounge to accommodate more people attending. I wonder if a lot of people had trouble registering on the Celebrity website and went to guest services after boarding so they needed to change the venue? The event was very well attended with over 100 passengers, and 5 or 6 ship officers including Captain Leo, Hotel Director Jamie, and the Cruise Director Eddy. Jamie made a point of saying that he reads Cruise Critic to learn what we do and don’t like. He mentioned that he has seen people complain that Celebrity no longer offers 14 day cruises, and he reassured us that once the 5 new ships finish construction and enter the fleet, more itineraries will be available. He encouraged us to let him know early if something bothers us so he can do something to fix it, and not to wait until we get home to make complaints when it’s too late for him to do anything about it. Fair enough! The officers spoke for a few minutes and then left us to mingle amongst ourselves. On our 2016 cruise, the Cruise Director did a question and answer session so we could ask him anything we had wanted to know, but they did not give us that opportunity today (at least not in an open forum… I am sure if someone had a question and asked them individually, they would have been happy to answer it.)
We stayed at the meet and greet for about 30 minutes, then left to find some lounge chairs in the shade on deck 12 by the pool. Surprisingly, we quickly found 2 seats together despite a healthy amount of chair hogs. The 5 chairs opposite us remained vacant and reserved for over an hour.
I love that the pool bar staff makes frequent rounds with a drink cart stocked with water, soda, and beer, and others are walking around to take specific drink orders. It really helps to keep me in full lazy mode hehe
Cruise Director Eddy hosted a music trivia game at the pool so we decided to play since we didn’t have to move and we could participate right from our lounge chairs. The theme was Heaven and Angels, so every song had one of those 2 words in the title, and we had to guess the artist and title name for each of 15 songs, for 1 point each. We did fairly well with a score of 16 and we were one of the top 10 scores, but I think the winner scored 20 points. When you win any of the games or activities on board, you get a coupon which can be redeemed for a prize on the last day of the cruise, so it’s fun to have a little extra incentive to participate above just the glory of winning.
Eventually we got hungry for lunch, so we left our lounge chairs to grab a quick lunch. I ran down to the MDR to check out the lunch menu, but decided against staying because I didn’t think I would finish eating fast enough to return to my lounge chair within 30 minutes.
Instead, I went back up to the Oceanview Café for the American BBQ themed lunch buffet. I picked out a few things to try, including some delicious pineapple BBQ pork ribs, then went over to the Mast Grill for a cheeseburger and fries. There is just something about eating a cheeseburger by the pool that screams “vacation” to me!
We stayed at the pool area until 3pm when the Martini Bar opened, and then we went down there so DH could upgrade to the premium beverage package. Although any bartender on the ship can process this for you, I have read that whoever does your upgrade gets to keep the tips so we wanted to do it at a bar we knew we would spend a lot of time at. When we got there, there was only 1 guy working so only DH did his upgrade and we decided to wait until another bartender was there for me to upgrade so we could spread out the tips. It wasn’t like we were going to get a drink right then anyway, so I didn’t mind waiting a little longer to upgrade.
Next, we went upstairs to check out the afternoon hot glass show. We immediately recognized Tom as one of the gaffers from our 2016 cruise, so it was nice to see a familiar face. Unfortunately, it was very windy today so the gaffers were having some trouble working with the glass and they even dropped and broke a piece that was nearly finished! At least it was interesting to see that things don’t always turn out perfectly and to observe how they clean broken glass out of the oven before it melts. We watched as they created 2 more pieces, including a cup with a pineapple texture on the outside, and a double-walled bowl that was created by both blowing and sucking the glass (I didn’t realize that was even possible haha)
After 45 minutes, we were too cold from the wind so we left to get ready for the evening. When we got back to the cabin, we found some special treats waiting for us. Albertina delivered a cheese platter and a fruit platter. We realized that this would be too much food for us to finish without spoiling our dinner appetite, and since the cheese platter has some fruit on it too, we ended up asking Albertina to skip the separate fruit platter from now on. The one thing that we didn’t love was the saltines… does anyone actually like saltines?! We did see that there were better crackers at the buffet so we asked Albertina if we could have something besides saltines, but apparently this request was too complicated because it took until mid-way through the cruise before we accomplished this mission. For the meantime, we enjoyed our cheese with saltines.
It was still very windy outside, but at least the clouds had cleared! What a beautiful view!!
Tonight was the first Chic Night and we always like to get dressed up nicely, even though it is no longer considered “formal night”. Instead of having the ship photographers take our photo for a fee, we asked a fellow passenger to take a photo on my camera for free. It can be hard to find a good spot for a nice photo because the ship photographers always hog the best places, but we found a good spot near the Martini Bar.
Now that we’ve properly documented our fancy outfits, we could really get the evening started. First up, we went to the Martini Bar where I ordered the Tropitini (another one of my favorites!), made with Grey Goose vodka, Bacardi Limon rum, blue curacao, and pineapple juice.
We still had some time before dinner so we went over to the World Class Bar. I was surprised to find 5 other couples there when we arrived, since on our last cruise there was never anyone there. I ordered my favorite cocktail from their menu- the Ciroc Tropically Yours. It is like a gourmet pina colada. Yum!
Just like in 2016, we opted for select dining for our dinners on this cruise. I find the early seating to be too early on port days if we both need to shower and get changed after coming back on the ship (especially if we want to watch the sail away first!), and the late seating is just way too late for me (I would fall asleep at the table before they even served my entrée lol). Before the cruise, I fought with the Celebrity website (possibly the worst part of cruising with this line!!) and used the vacation planner to book us 7pm dinner reservations for every night of the cruise. Select dining is great as an alternative to the fixed seating times, but if you don’t make reservations in advance, they often need to give you a pager and you must wait until there is a table available. My vacation time is too precious to wait with a pager, so I love that we can book reservations online before the cruise. We find that 7pm works well for us so we have time for a pre-dinner drink or two, and can finish our meal in time for the 9pm shows in the main theater each night.
When we arrived at the hostess desk at the Moonlight Sonata Main Dining Room, there was a short line before we got to the front. The 2 parties in front of us were both given pagers to wait for a table to open up, but we were seated immediately. I asked the hostess, Cervine, to seat us with a fun waiter because we hoped to like our team and request to eat in their section each night. We were seated at a table for 2 with Pinto as our head waiter and Jose as the assistant waiter.
In the past, we have enjoyed sitting at large tables and getting to know other passengers while we dine. That is not necessary on Celebrity because even though we had a table for 2, we were just a few inches from the tables on either side and couldn’t help but chat with our neighbors. The added perk is that we find the larger tables lead to extremely long meals as you need to wait for them to fill the table, and then wait for everyone to finish each course before going to the next course (and inevitably someone orders more food or takes much longer to eat their food which holds up the rest of the table), and the whole process can take well over 2 hours from start to finish. By sitting at a table for 2, we could set the pace of our own meal but still chat with those around us, and whenever we are ready to leave, we can say good night and leave without feeling like we ditched the rest of our table before they were done.
Within seconds of sitting down, Jose brought us tonight’s dinner menu and explained the flavors of the 3 butters he left on the table to enjoy with our bread. I very rarely eat bread before a meal at a restaurant, but on Celebrity, I make an exception because the flavored butters are just so yummy!
I mentioned to Pinto that we planned to share a few of the appetizers and a few entrees, and he offered to bring out all of the dishes for each course at the same time. At the time, I liked that idea because it made it easier to share everything, but looking back, it also helped to speed the meal along because they didn’t serve each dish individually and we could eat as much of each dish as we wanted at our own pace. Like I said… my vacation time is precious!
Chicken Liver Parfait
Salmon Tartare
Shrimp Scampi
Celebrity’s Signature Beef Tournedos
Roasted Colorado Rack of Lamb
Stuffed Portobello Mushroom (I kind of felt bad for any vegetarian who ordered this as their only entrée… it was quite small and we shared it as a side dish but I imagine if this was your only entrée that you would be quite hungry after dinner!)
Dessert Menu
Warm Apple Crumble (minus the ‘a la mode’)
Everything was delicious and we were done with our entire meal in an hour and 15 minutes… just how we like it! That meant we had time for a drink at the Gastro Bar before going to the show. The house band was performing in the Grand Foyer so we listened to them until it was time to get seats for the show in the theater. One thing I really love about cruising with Celebrity is that they have so many live musicians playing throughout the ship. There were many times when we had to pick between multiple options because there were just so many different musical acts on board… to clarify, this is a good problem to have! Haha Between the solo guitarist, the strings duo, the house band, the dance band, the acoustic duo, and of course the Eclipse orchestra performing many shows with the singers and dancers on board in the main theater, there is always something to suit everyone’s taste.
At 8:45pm, we went over to the theater to find seats for the show and it was already one third full. Tonight’s show was called Topper and featured the singers and dancers on board, backed by the Eclipse orchestra. The basic plot is that a man has a giant top hot and he locks people inside it to keep them around as his friends. The show teaches the lesson that if you let these people go free, they will voluntarily return to hang out with you and you don’t have to keep them in captivity. I’m not sure how I felt about that plotline, but it didn’t really matter because I greatly enjoyed all of the pop music and costumes throughout the show. Plus, anytime the aerial acts perform is a win in my book!
The show was one hour long, so when it ended at 10pm, we went straight upstairs to the Sky Lounge to listen to the house band play at the Motown theme party. I was really surprised at how crowded it was up there! Maybe because it was the first of 2 consecutive sea days and people could sleep late this morning and tomorrow morning, but there was quite a lively crowd for so late at night.
We left at the end of their set to go back to the cabin and get some rest after a wonderful first day a sea.
*When my Fitbit said I did 33 flights of stairs yesterday, I believed it because we opted for the stairs over the elevator many times (including the 10 flights of stairs to get from our muster station to the sail away party). Something tells me I did not actually walk up 82 flights of stairs today! More likely, this can be attributed to the strong winds causing the ship to rock and roll… up and down… all day long. We spent most of the day sitting today, but maybe the flights tracker got confused and interpreted that as me walking up a flight of stairs? I don’t know for sure, but just wait until you see my flight total for tomorrow!!
Before I get too far into the review, I want to take a few posts to give you a tour of the ship. Throughout the 2 weeks, I took photos of the public spaces around the ship, so I am not sure exactly which days I took each of these photos but I’ll just share them all here, deck by deck starting at deck 3, going forward to aft on the ship.
Deck 3
Guest Relations
Gastro Bar
Grand Foyer
Mid-ship elevators
Main Dining Room
Giant Wine Rack in the Dining Room
Breakfast menu
Deck 4
Celebrity Central
Entertainment Court
Quasar Dance Club
Casino
Casino Bar
Shops across from the casino
Martini Bar
Martini Bar menu
Cellar Masters wine bar
Grand Foyer
Deck 5
Eclipse Theater (taken from the upper level, but the theater actually spans decks 3, 4, and 5)
Restroom outside the theater (don’t worry, no one else was in here when I took the photo!)
Galleria Boutiques (does anyone actually buy anything at these stores?! I never once saw anyone shopping in these stores, let alone making a purchase!)
Art Gallery (set up for an art auction on one of the sea days)
World Class Bar
Café al Bacio
I just noticed the guy behind the counter photo bombed me!
Sushi on 5 Specialty Restaurant
Looking down over the Grand Foyer
Funky art in the hallway walking aft to the Ensemble Lounge
Ensemble Lounge
Funky art in the hallway outside the specialty restaurants at the aft of deck 5
Decks 6-11 are all passenger cabins, although there are a few public spaces near the mid-ship glass elevators. I didn’t take any photos on Deck 6 at the Apple iLounge, but that is where you can go to access the internet at the computer lab. They also teach classes about how to use various Apple products, and there is a small Apple store there too.
Deck 7
Multi-use space near the mid-ship elevators where they put the desks for the Captain’s Club, Future Cruise bookings, and Team Earth
Deck 8
Card Room near the mid-ship elevators
I am 99% sure these were outside the mid-ship elevators on Deck 8 (if not, it was at that location on a different deck). I thought they were really fun… it was a series of shadow boxes filled with brightly colored crocheted balloons and confetti and it made me smile every time I saw it when the elevator doors opened on that deck.
Deck 10
The Library- This photo was taken at 7:30am on the 4th sea day and it was probably the only time I ever saw the library empty. Practically all day, every day, there were people sitting in the library either reading a book or knitting or whatever. The library did have quite an impressive collection of books, sorted and alphabetized by fiction or nonfiction.
Various views of the live tree in the atrium. I love how it seems to float in the middle of the huge open space of the elevators.
Deck 12
This nifty directory hangs next to the elevators on every deck to help you find your way around the ship.
There is a similar directory inside all the elevators which lists what is located on each deck… it’s hard to see (both in this photo and in real life) but it lights up the deck you are on to make it even more obvious
Solarium Pool (must be over age 16 to be in this area)
Solarium seating (with extra thick cushions on the lounge chairs!) Don’t be confused by all of the towels on the chairs… they are clean and placed there by the pool attendants
There are 2 of these hammocks on either side of the ship, located just aft of the doors between the solarium and the main pool area… I almost never saw anyone sitting on the hammock, but aside from this one rare moment, I always saw towels and books on here. It’s really a shame that so many people hogged these hammocks as there are only 2 of them on the ship and surely other people would have loved to use them
Pool Bar
Main Pool
Deck chairs near the pool (note: this was taken at 8am on a sea day, so it IS possible to find an open seat if you wake up early enough!)
Sitting area at the aft of the pool area (we spent a lot of time in the area throughout the cruise because we could often find 2 empty chairs and pull them together in the corner, and I loved having shade from Deck 14 overhead)
Deck 14
Sky Lounge
Unobstructed forward views out the Sky Lounge windows
Mast Bar
Overlooking the pool from between the Mast Bar and Mast Grill
Mast Grill
Lots of seating near the Mast Grill
Overlooking the pool from the aft side
Couches in the outdoor seating area at the Oceanview Bar
Outdoor seating for the Oceanview Café (this is where we camped out on embarkation day)
Overlooking the outdoor seating at the Oceanview Café with an awesome view of the wake
Standing at the edge of the railing on the Oceanview Café looking down… If you have an aft-facing balcony, be aware that people can see you from higher decks if you stand out by your railing!
Deck 15
Funky wood benches located just aft of the mid-ship elevators
The Lawn Club
Hot Glass Show area
Bocce and Lawn Bowling area
Sunset Bar (our favorite spot for sailing away from port each afternoon!)
This seating area was mid-way down the stairs from the Sunset Bar to the seating outside the Oceanview Café. In theory, it would have been the best spot to sit if you could snag the seats because it’s like your own private deck, but it didn’t work for me because there’s no shade at all out there. Bummer!
Miscellaneous art from around the ship that I thought was interesting…
Look very closely… can you see what is making up the colorful parts of this picture??
That concludes my tour of the Celebrity Eclipse cruise ship. It is a beautiful, modern ship, with interesting public spaces both indoors and out.
Today was our last sea day and we had to move our clocks ahead one hour again last night. I woke up at 8am and spent an hour packing while J slept a little longer. Once he was awake, we went upstairs to the Oceanview Cafe for breakfast at the buffet. I really liked that they had waiters walking around to take drink orders. It is hard enough to juggle a plate of food and silverware without a tray, so the drink waiters made it so we had one less thing to carry around the buffet. With no real plans for today other than relaxing and soaking up every last minute of our time on the Equinox, we opted for some real drinks at breakfast!
Paris Screwdriver and Celebrity Bloody Mary
Outside of the buffet, they had a map showing the course we traveled during the cruise. On other cruises, I have seen live maps which showed where the ship was in addition to where we had been, but this map stayed static all week.
This morning, there were a few activities in the big theater that we were interested in checking out. The first was a presentation about ship navigation given by Staff Captain Matthew. He explained the process of making a cruise itinerary and knowing how long it takes to get from port to port and how to look at the sea maps. He spoke for about 20 minutes and we thought it was very informative about things that we never really knew much about.
After that, there was a Q&A session with Hotel Director Jamie and Captain Costas for about 45 minutes. The Captain was very funny and approachable, and we learned a lot of interesting facts about life on the ship and how things work behind the scenes.
After the talk, we went back up to the buffet for lunch. While we were in the elevator, I looked up and saw the Captain was in the elevator with us. I realized there was a question I didn’t get to ask him at the Q&A so I figured I had his company for a few seconds in the elevator, so why not ask now? He was so friendly and didn’t mind chatting with me at all. He was even nice enough to pose for a picture with us when we got off the elevator!
Apparently I was slacking on this last day of the cruise as I didn’t take any photos of my breakfast or my lunch! I think J had another burger from the mast grill and I had some things from the buffet. After we finished lunch, we went down to the Slush bar to try the last 2 drinks we hadn’t tried yet. So for those of you keeping track, this was the first bar where we accomplished tasting all of the drinks over the course of the cruise!
Walking through the pool area, we noticed that the chair hogs were out in full force today! We actually noticed this a lot over the whole cruise. Whenever we walked through the pool area or the solarium, we often saw more lounge chairs being occupied with books, hats, and water bottles than with people! We found 2 empty chairs surrounded by loungers and chairs being hogged by people who were no where to be seen. We sat and listened to an acoustic guitar player near the pool, and none of these people returned to their chairs while we were there. I have no idea how long they were gone or if/when they came back to their chairs, but I wished Celebrity did a better job at patrolling this.
We spent some time relaxing on our balcony this afternoon, and a little more time packing. At around 3pm, I wanted to get my free scoop of gelato so we went downstairs. I loved how there was a tree hanging in the middle of the space between the glass elevators. It was such a unique feature on a cruise ship and looked so elegant floating there in the middle of the lobby.
When I went to get my free scoop of gelato, there was a different lady working from last night, and she let me get sprinkles on my scoop of mint chip ice cream! Score! While we were there, we noticed they were doing the auction from the hot glass show. As part of their contract with the Corning Museum of Glass, the gaffers get to auction off 7 pieces that were made at their shows during our cruise. I had no intentions of bidding, but it was fun to watch the process. Some of those pieces sold for over $2000, and all of the money goes to charity, so it was all very exciting.
Before we knew it, it was time to get ready for the evening. Before dinner, we stopped by the martini bar so we could try the last 2 martinis on our list (another bar that we fully completed!)
A Cosmo and a Peartini
When we got to the hostess stand for our 7pm dinner reservations, Gorica said there was a wait tonight and she had to give us a beeper if we wanted to sit with our normal waiters. I guess more people show up to dinner on the last night of the cruise? I was sad to have a beeper and a wait time, but there was no chance we would skip sitting with our favorite waiters and miss the chance to say goodbye to them!!
The wait wasn’t very long, and once we were seated, the service was excellent as always.
My last chance for some escargots (…until my next cruise!)
For some reason, the French Onion Soup had more black pepper in it tonight so I didn’t enjoy it as much as I did earlier in the week…
Aged Prime Rib of Beef
Dessert menu
Biscuit Croustillant
Thank you to Fredys and Arsapha for wonderful dining room service!
After dinner, we went back to the cabin to throw a few extra things in our big checked suitcase so we could put it out in the hallway on time for the stewards to collect it. I think the bags had to be out in the hall by 10pm.
The final show of the cruise was a medley of Broadway songs by 6 of the singers from the production shows. This had the potential to be a great show, but they picked songs from obscure shows that I have never seen (and I have seen over 70 shows on Broadway!)… Miss Saigon, Bridges of Madison County, Thoroughly Modern Millie, and Company to name a few. They sang a song from Dream Girls, but I only knew that song because I’ve seen the movie, not the Broadway show. They ended the show with songs from Wicked and Les Mis so at least we knew both of those songs too. The singers had fabulous voices, likely because they picked songs that suited their range (as opposed to the songs assigned to them in the production shows which weren’t always so great), but the show would have been more fun if they sang songs from more popular shows.
After the show, we tried the last two drinks from the World Class Bar menu, so that was the third bar list we completed!
There was an 80’s dance party at Quasar so we spent the rest of the night dancing until midnight! After that, we went up to the buffet for some pizza, and noticed that the pool looked so beautiful all lit up at night.
We did not have any drinks on Friday before debarking, so our quest to try every drink on the ship ended tonight. Although we did not accomplish our mission, I think we did a pretty good job over the last 11 days. We drank about ¾ of the drinks on the menus on the ship, and a lot of the ones we didn’t try was because either we couldn’t find a bar to make that drink or because the ship didn’t have the drink on board (most of the wines!) It was fun to be on this quest, and our dining room waiters and sommelier as well as the bartenders we went to most often all knew about our mission and were eager to help us achieve our goals. Throughout the week, they asked us about our progress and helped to find new drinks for us to check off the list. You will also notice the little D or J next to each drink and a + or – sign… we marked off who had each drink (or used no initial if we both tried it) and a + if we loved it or a – if we didn’t like it (no + or – meant it was neutral haha). At least now we’ll know the best drinks to go for on our Eclipse cruise!! Here is a photo of the list at the end of the cruise…
I know many frequent cruisers have been to Grand Cayman so many times that they don’t even bother to get off the ship at this port, but I was super excited to come here as it was a brand new port to me! After years of reading other peoples reviews, I knew there was one place I HAD to go when I finally got to Grand Cayman… Sting Ray City!! The idea of standing out there on a sand bar in waist-deep crystal clear blue water while sting rays swim around my legs, and getting to touch and hold the sting rays sounded so incredible that I knew I wanted to experience it first hand. There are many private companies offering boat tours to Sting Ray City plus one or two snorkel stops, so I sent out a few emails to see if anyone had space for us. Unfortunately, I got many replies saying they were already booked that day! As popular of a port as Grand Cayman is, the day we would be there was one for the record books as there would be over 21,000 cruise ship passengers on 7 ships in port that day! After contacting a few more companies, I was finally able to book us on a tour with Captain Marvin’s, going to 2 snorkel stops plus Sting Ray City, for $45 per person. This is the description of the tour from their website:
Captain Marvin Three-Stop Stingray/Snorkel Tours: Our three-stop stingray/snorkel tour lasts three hours, dock to dock. The three-stop stingray/snorkel trip goes to the Stingray City sandbar plus TWO snorkel stops, both the Barrier Reef AND the Coral Gardens. The cost of this tour is US$45/person for ages 12 and over, US$30/person for ages 4-11, and free for children under age 4. We strongly recommend that you bring flotation devices for children under age 4, as our snorkel gear is for ages 4 and over. We provide snorkel vests, life vests, mask, snorkel and fins for everyone ages 4 and over. You are welcome to bring your own gear if you like. We offer complimentary shuttle service from your hotel or condo on Seven Mile Beach. It is also strongly recommended that you know how to swim in order to be safe for the snorkeling stop. Our three-stop stingray/snorkel tour is available every day of the week. The schedule from Monday through Friday is 10 AM until 1 PM, and 2:30 until 5:30 PM. On weekends, the schedule is from 9 AM until 12 noon, and from 1:00 until 4:00 PM.
Our original plan was to go to Seven Mile Beach after the tour as it is said to be a beautiful beach, and they said they could drop us off there free of charge. In addition to this being my first time in Grand Cayman, it would also be my first time at a tender port. I wasn’t thrilled about the idea of not being able to come and go from the ship whenever we wanted to, and I was unsure of how the ticket process worked. Since we weren’t booked in a suite and don’t have elite status, I was afraid we might have a long wait before we could get off the ship. Our tour started at 10am, but we needed to check in at Captain Marvin’s office by 9:15am. With the first tender starting around 8am, we knew we had to be on one of the first tenders to be on time for our tour. We spoke to someone at guest services the day before to find out the logistics of how the tendering process works. She said that they will have tickets available for pick up from the Gastrobar starting at 8am on a first come, first served basis. Our plan was to be there promptly at 8am in hopes of getting one of the lower tender numbers so we could get off the ship ASAP.
Knowing it would be another early morning, we put our room service breakfast door tag out last night and requested the 7-7:30am time slot. We were still fast asleep when the phone rang at 6:42am to tell us our food was on the way. I guess I can’t really complain because I would rather it be delivered early than late, but geez! We weren’t ready to eat THAT early! On the bright side, we were able to eat breakfast outside on the balcony as we watched the ships sailing into port.
The local tenders were much bigger than I expected, with 2 levels that held hundreds of people.
The weather was so beautiful for the entire cruise, but those dark grey clouds didn’t look promising for today’s forecast!
I was on my way down to the Gastrobar at 8am to get our tender tickets when John came on the overhead to announce that the first tender was ready and we could get on now with no wait. I did an about-face in the hallway and went back to the cabin to get J, and we went down to deck 2 to board the tender. Having never done this before, I wasn’t sure what to expect, but the whole process was fairly painless. We walked down a few stairs to a platform where crew members were waiting to help us climb onto the tender.
The tender was only about half full when we got there so we waited for 5 minutes while the rest of the boat filled up. We found seats on the upstairs deck hoping for a pretty view of the Equinox as we sailed to shore.
Once enough people were onboard, they took in the ropes and we were on our way.
Remember those scary dark clouds hovering above our ship all morning? Well they decided to open up and rain down on us while we were on the 10 minute tender ride! So much for the pretty views from the top deck!! I went downstairs to seek cover as the rain was cold and uncomfortable while on a moving boat. We reached the pier on shore by 8:15am and filed out of the boat, down the short pier, and into the port.
Since we were still very early for our tour, we spent a few minutes walking around the port area and checking out the stores. It was already getting crowded because some of the other ships started running their tenders earlier than us.
Captain Marvin’s store was located 1 block to the left of the port area, and it was very easy to find with this huge sign out front.
There were already tons of people waiting around, so we got in line and tried to figure out what to do next. They passed around a clipboard with a waiver we had to sign… you know, the usual stuff- if we die, we can’t sue them! haha Once we got to the front of the line, the lady asked us to pay our $45 per person in US dollars, gave us a receipt, and told us to come back at 9:30am for our bus to the boat. It was only 8:45 so we spent some time at the nearby stores and walking around the port area.
We went back to check in again at Captain Marvin’s store at 9:15am (15 minutes before we were told to return), and the lady organizing everyone to get on the buses, Anna, was very upset with us. She said she was looking for us and yelling our name, but that our bus left without us at 9am. I said the lady in the store told us to return at 9:30, but Anna said we should have been back by 9am. We wouldn’t have left the area had we known we only had 15 minutes to wait!! What’s more, the tour details that came with our original confirmation email stated we needed to check in by 9:15am so why would we need to be back to their office by 9am?? Had the tender not worked out so easily, it is possible that we would still be trying to get ashore at 9am!!
Anyway, Anna found space for us on a different boat, and a bus came within 2 minutes so we hopped on and headed off to the boat dock. Our bus driver’s name was Dennis, and he spent the entire 30 minute ride giving us a very entertaining speech about Grand Cayman. Did you know that the rental cars in Grand Cayman have white license plates whereas the locals have yellow license plates? They drive on the left side of the road, so the white plates help the locals identify the tourists so they can stay a safe distance away because most tourists aren’t used to driving on the left side of the road! haha!
Our boat for the tour was 2 stories tall, and we had 3 guides and 40 people on the tour. When we booked the tour, I was told we would have a maximum of 20 people on our tour, and the guides said they hadn’t had 40 people on a tour in many months, but with over 21,000 people in port, I guess they allowed more people to book the tour. There was enough seating for everyone on one of the two decks, but I doubt we could have comfortably fit anyone else! J and I sat upstairs and enjoyed a 30 minute ride to Sting Ray City.
Today was extremely windy and the water was very choppy. At 10:30, we arrived at Sting Ray City and it was already very crowded.
The guides tried to park our boat between the other boats, but the winds were tossing us around a lot. There was so little space that he gave up and said we would go snorkeling first and come back here later when it was less crowded. I doubted his logic, knowing that popular tour destinations tend to get more crowded as the day goes on, not less crowded! I had also read that many of the sting rays leave the sand bar after they get fed by the first few tourists in the morning so I was really bummed to have to come back later.
We motored away from Sting Ray City to a reef about 5 minutes away (we could still see Sting Ray City from the reef). The guides said we could borrow snorkels, masks, and fins if we wanted to, and we could spend 30 minutes snorkeling at the reef. The waves were pretty rough, but it wasn’t that hard to snorkel because you could just float and let the current take you around. There was excellent snorkeling at this site with so many interesting fish to see. This is just a handful of the many photos I took while snorkeling…
I got tired pretty quickly so I swam back to the boat after about 20 minutes. Once everyone else was on board, we motored back to Sting Ray City, and of course, it was even more crowded than it was an hour ago!
The winds were still very high so I wished we had stayed here before. It was scary to watch them attempt to park the boat as we came close to hitting our neighbors many times. Eventually they were able to squeeze into a small spot and drop the anchor so we could climb out into the water.
Sting Ray City is a sand bar in the middle of the sea where it is shallow enough to stand and it is usually fairly calm waters, but today with the high winds and rough current, we were getting knocked around a lot. It was very hard to keep our balance as the waves kept crashing over us. Once all 40 people from our boat were in the water, we all crowded around one guide with one sting ray. In my research prior to the cruise, all the photos I had seen of Sting Ray City showed tons of Sting Rays swimming around, but we did not experience that at all today. All 40 of us had to ‘share’ this one sting ray so we had very limited time to really play with it.
The guide told us we could touch the sting ray
Then the guide held up the sting ray so we could see the bottom… I took this photo at exactly the right second as he was spitting out water!
Then the guide told us it was time for us to hold the sting rays. We all took turns taking our photos and holding the sting rays, and we were able to find one of the other tourists on our boat to take photos for us.
They say you get 7 years of good luck if you kiss a sting ray…
The guide pushed the sting ray up onto our back for a back massage!
Some people had a chance to feed the sting rays but I didn’t know where to get the food and I was tired of being tossed around and bumping into people so I just got back on the boat. Sting Ray City has the potential to be lots of fun, but we hit a double whammy with rougher than normal seas and winds, and a more crowded than normal port day. Hopefully I get a chance to take this tour again some day with better conditions!
I was glad our boat wasn’t as crowded as their boat!!
Once we were all back on the boat, we motored about 10 minutes to another reef for some more snorkeling. There were 2 stingrays who frequently swim around this reef- one without a tail, so they called him Frisbee! haha
There was a lot of coral at this reef, but I thought the fish were better at the first stop. The real highlight was swimming with the sting rays! Unlike at Sting Ray City, we had plenty of space to spread out and explore and have one-on-one time with the sting rays. They are so elegant as they glide across through the water, and it was amazing that they were totally unthreatened by us swimming in their waters.
This was Frisbee haha
It was very hard to swim back to the boat when I was ready to stop snorkeling as I was swimming against the current. Once everyone was back on board, we spent 30 minutes motoring back to the dock. On the way, the guides served us water and fruit juice.
Apparently in Grand Cayman, they steer motorized vehicles with their feet! haha
We had exactly 3 hours on the boat, plus 30-40 minutes on the bus each way. Overall, I thought Captain Marvin offered good value at $45 per person, but they could use better organization with the buses. Only one bus came to pick us up after we got off the boat, but that bus only holds 25 people and we had 40 people on our tour. I’m sure the 25 person bus is normally big enough, but they knew we had 40 people on this tour and they should have sent 2 buses to get us. We were lucky enough to fit on the bus, but there were 15 people left waiting at the dock when we pulled away. I am sure another bus came to pick them up, but I don’t know how long they had to wait.
We got back to the Captain Marvin store near the cruise port at 1:45pm. J and I originally considered going to Seven Mile Beach after our tour, and the bus driver was willing to drop us off there if we so desired, but dark rain clouds were rolling back in and we were tired from all that time in the water, so we just wanted to go back to the ship. Also, I had a feeling that the beach would be a mob scene by this time of the day with all these ships in port and I didn’t feel like fighting the crowds.
There is a little stand-alone cigar shop directly across the street from Captain Marvin’s store (unfortunately, I don’t remember the store name). J was curious so we went in for a few minutes and ended up having a really great shopping experience. Giuliano was the guy working behind the counter and he gave helpful advice and was very knowledgeable about the different types of cigars sold in his store.
After that, we went back through the port area to find a long line at the tender dock. Luckily, a tender pulled up just after we got there and everyone on line was able to fit on this boat. Once we were back on the Equinox, we went straight up to the Oceanview Cafe for a late lunch. J had a burger and I had the stir fry. Again, it seemed like no one knew about the stir fry station and there was no line to place my order.
We grabbed a table outside and ordered a round of frozen cocktails to cool off as we enjoyed our lunch with a view.
After lunch, we went back to the cabin to spend some time relaxing on the balcony and watching the tenders return to our ship and other ships leave port.
Celebrity Silhouette
Carnival Magic
Our first stop on tonight’s pre-dinner drinks tour brought us to the Ensemble Lounge. We didn’t spend much time here during the cruise, but I did like that they usually had some live music playing whenever we walked by. I ordered the Kir Royale (Domaine Chandon Brut sparkling wine and Chambord Black Raspberry liquor) and J had a beer.
Our next stop was the World Class Bar. Aside from the time we spent here during the mixology class, we had yet to spend any time at this bar. For some reason, I thought all of the drinks here were above the $13 limit of the Premium Beverage Package… maybe that was something I had read here on Cruise Critic prior to the cruise? We were pleasantly surprised to learn that EVERY drink on the menu at the World Class Bar cost $12, just like at the martini bar, so we could have any drink we wanted! We spent the next 2 days trying every drink on the menu (to be fair, there’s only 10 drinks and we each only ordered 5 and then tasted each others drinks). We started with 2 of the most exotic drinks on the menu…
Bulleit Infusion (I thought they would give us the entire pitcher, but they only pour out a little into a glass and put the rest of the pitcher back behind the counter)…
Double fisting the shakers
Mystic Ketel One
Infusing the rum in the Zacapa Above the Clouds with applewood smoke
The Ciroc Tropically Yours tasted like a gourmet pina colada!
Dinner was delicious as usual, although I didn’t have a huge appetite tonight (likely due to all those yummy drinks at the World Class Bar, plus the fact that we ate lunch fairly late).
Whole Wheat Orecchiette
Crispy Salt Cod Bacalao Croquettes
Fusilli Pasta
We decided to skip dessert tonight, so I apologize for not having photos of that menu.
Tonight’s show was the Tenors of Rock and we thought it was one of the best shows over the whole cruise! They were a group of 4 singers who did a variety of rock songs from the 60’s, 70’s, and 80’s, and some of them were in unique arrangements to put their own spin on the song. Their voices were far better than the voices of the singers in the production shows, so that really added to our enjoyment of this show.
After the show, we walked around the ship for a bit. At around 10:50pm, J decided he wanted to use his Captain’s Club coupon for the free scoop of gelato (this was the only perk we cared about so we wanted to make sure to use it before the end of the cruise!), so we figured we would be fine to get it before the gelato bar closed at 11pm. I was told earlier in the week by someone at guest services that we did not need the paper coupon when we redeemed our free scoop because the info was on our seapass card and the person at the counter would know we hadn’t redeemed it yet when they swiped our card. When we got there, the lady said that she did need to have the paper coupon to give us the free scoop. Of course we didn’t have it on us because we didn’t think we would need it! So with 10 minutes to go until they closed, we ran back to the cabin, grabbed the paper coupon, and ran back downstairs to the gelato bar, arriving at 10:57pm. By now, there was a second woman behind the counter who was helping to clean up, and she was very strict. She would not let him make an ice cream sandwich (which I had read on Cruise Critic that people were able to do that on their cruises), and she said he could only pick 1 flavor and no toppings. J opted for rum raisin, and I opted to hold off on my scoop until tomorrow since I really wasn’t very hungry. That was one of many times during the cruise that we got false or inaccurate information from the people at guest services (J got at least 4 different answers when he asked 4 different people how many laps around the track equal one mile HAHA And he also got false information about the pricing for the mixology class).
On our way leaving the gelato bar, we ran into some people from our tour in Panama at Cafe al Bacio, so we sat and chatted with them until midnight, then went back to the cabin to go to bed.
Dana's Destination Diary 