Last Day photos
Today is Sunday, 2/6/2005
There was an abbreviated double-sided, one sheet news letter and a double-sided, one sheet letter with our "Bon Voyage Information" last night. This morning there is only a breakfast buffet in The Grand Dining Room at 7am and we are to have vacated our staterooms by 8am and everyone is to be off the ship by 9am. The buffet is well-stocked, but the waitstaff in the tables is off. We are seated at a table for 6 and only 2 of us have water and coffee, 2 have coffee and we have nothing. There are no salt and pepper shakers on the table. It is organized chaos. Everyone at the table manages to get something to eat and drink and back to vacate our rooms within the hour alloted us.
We are out by 8am and take our carryons out in the atrium and sit with another couple working on the jigsaw puzzle. We have not seen them working on it before but she is upset that it will be left incomplete and wonders if the next cruise will complete it. Debbie says again that it will never be complete by the time we leave and she thinks that it will be replaced with a fresh puzzle for the next group this afternoon. The woman looks stunned and I think maybe Debbie is not such a terrible obsessive/compulsive after all. She has accepted from day one that this puzzle will not be done, ever.
We were in the last group to be disembarked about quarter to 9AM. We walked right off the ship, through customs, and to the taxi line. Negotiated a $10 round trip to drop our baggage at Barrachina and back to the ferry pier. (Barrachina is a restaraunt/jewelry store that the Puerto Rican Tourism Co. and RSSC recommended when asked what we should do with our luggage since there is no where to store it at the piers. They do not charge for this service, but accept tips. The guy that took our bags at Barrachina said the "standard tip" is $5, which was what we had planned to give him anyway. They have a big interior room just off the patio dining area devoted to storing baggage. They gave us a slip with a bag count on it when we checked the bags in and he double checked that we were taking that number out when we checked the bags out.) The taxi driver was not too happy because he was hoping to fill his van and go to the airport, but he took us and even carried Debbie's bag and got Barrachina to open up a few minutes early to accept our bags so he could get back in the taxi line at the ship. (That may have been a lost cause for him because there were probably fewer than 50 people left on the ship when we left it based on the line of luggage remaining in the terminal.) We took the public ferry from Pier 2 in Old San Juan (it is the short one) and bought round trip tickets (which was 4 identical tickets at $.50 each). From Old San Juan you have to specify to Catano, not Hato Rey. From Catano back, the ferries only go to Old San Juan. When you arrive in Catano, walk out the front door under the covered walkway to the sidewalk, it looks like buses and taxis should stop right there but we were assured by the locals that they don't for the Bacardi tours. So, when you reach the street, turn right and walk one block to the green building, you can't miss it, you can see it from the ferry terminal. It appears to be a parking garage with lots of benches out front, we were there early Sunday morning in the rain, and there were only a few men milling about at the car entrance to the garage, they approached us and asked us if we wanted to go to the Bacardi Tour. We said yes and the price for the 2 of us in the van was $3 per person. (We were the only 2 passengers on the ferry going over!) The van picked up one more person on the way to Bacardi, got us there before 10AM and dropped us outside the gate (the guard refused his request to open it to even let us walk on over to the visitor's center.) After about 5-10 minutes, the guard yelled at us to come on through, opened the gate and pointed us in the right direction to walk. We arrived at the visitor's pavilion and gift shop right at 10AM. (Why did we not just take the ship's transfer tour to the airport? We don't like crowds. Our flight was after 5pm and we wanted our leisure for the day.) We got our 2 free drink tickets and waited with a mojito. They filled the first tram over with people from RSSC Diamond. We waited for things to quiet down and then rode over. You get a radio handset and watch a video and look at a reproduction of the Cuban site and listen to snippets about them, then more individual a/v stations, then the little barrels of smelling stations, then the bar demonstration (in a reproduction of a 1930's art deco bar from Cuba), then a big noisy room with videos and music with drawers to pull out but all the contents were on loan at the time so no idea what was supposed to be there. This is where you can send the free video emails (go behind the wall of Bacardi bottles and you will see the hallway with about4 terminals there), then the bathrooms and handset return, out the door to the trams. You will be driven by the factory and different parts of production may be pointed out then back to the bat wing pavilion and gift shop. It is mostly self-guided and self-paced, except that if you have come on a guided tour from a ship the Bacardi guides will keep you together by herding you from one room to another by closing and opening doors to keep you together and on the same tram, so if you go alone, you want to keep that in mind and not join a tram with a tour group on it if possible. We waited for the second tram which was still RSSC passengers, because large buses were just then arriving from other ships. Our observation was that the ship's tour groups did not have time to enjoy their free drinks and were rushed in the gift shop to exit and did not have time to enjoy or even have their 2nd free drinks after the tour was over. There was no hard sell to buy and as this was our last day, we had plenty of time to price liquor in PR and through the islands, it was most expensive at the Bacardi gift shop (we saw the same bottle for $7.95 in St. Thomas at Havensight and $9.95 at Bacardi). It was not a "distillery tour" as it is advertised by Bacardi. We thought it was a good way to spend a few hours early on a rainy Sunday morning. When we were ready to go, we walked over to the visitor's parking lot where there were several taxis waiting and we asked to be taken back to the ferry terminal (again we got an unhappy cabbie as he pressed to take us to our hotel instead) for $3 per person he drove us back and dropped us off at the green building one block from the ferry terminal.
When we came back on the ferry near Noon, it was very crowded with a big press of people lined up at the gate to board. There were still enough seats for everyone. In Old San Juan, we walked up Tanca St. uphill to Sol and ate lunch at El Jibarito, again. We really liked it the first and time and figured, why mess with success. The lunches there were $2-3 more on Sunday than they were on Weds., probably because there were several ships coming in that day, vs. Weds. There were a lot of local business people in there on Weds. and a lot of tourists on Sunday, anyway the food was the same and good and still not expensive, just a heads up that the price did increase. Then we walked over to Barrachina and picked up our luggage and a taxi to the airport, got there the recommended 3hours early and went through security in about 15 minutes. (There were looong lines at American even for the self-check-in kiosks, we had traveled with one carry on bag each for our short cruise and printed our boarding passes from the ship's internet facility.) We found the gate with the first flight to our connecting city and asked if since we were here early we could take it rather than wait (we were traveling on frequent flyer award tickets) they boarded us on the earlier flight in group 4 and we were on our way home by 4pm. After a long 5 hour flight to Dallas, we saw the end of the Super Bowl and boarded a final flight to RDU and got back on time just after 1AM. Took a short cab ride to the office parking and drove our car home, showered and in bed by 2. Back to work in a few hours. I asked Debbie if she was happy to be in our own bed and she said, yeah if this boat would just quit rocking. That is so weird, I feel like the floor is still making that strange Diamond motion too. It passed for me by Tuesday morning, but Debbie says she still feels it. She is still taking Bonine and wearing her bands intermittently throughout each day.
The End.
Thursday, February 10, 2005
St. Thomas evening
St. Thomas evening
Today is Saturday, 2/5/2005
We have dinner in The Grand Dining Room again. I forgot to photograph half the courses and couldn't tell you now what they were. I will say that during the evenings, the white wine that was being poured, in no particular order, was Sancerre, French Chardonnay, Pinot Grigio, either Pouilly-Fuisse or Fume, can't remember now. This is what comes of doing this from random slips of paper and not keeping a diary on the laptop. Oh, well, suffice it to say that we liked all the white wines and as usual for us did not drink any of the reds. Also, while Debbie has a limited number of foods she finds acceptable, it looks like she ate a month's worth of filet mignon in 3 nights. She was happy to find that a peppercorn sauce was offered with her steak each time, but sour cream, chives, etc. for her potato offered only 1 out of 3 times. She still came home a pound lighter than when she left. I did not weigh before or after, too much information and all.
We start to watch the movie on TV, "Windtalkers" which we have not seen before but, I fell asleep and Debbie said it was a war movie, she did not like and she went to sleep too. We are almost all packed up and we have an early morning tomorrow.
Some cruises end with a feeling of, your time is up and you need to get out of here and some don't. We have seen both kinds and it seems to vary not only by line but by ship and even from one sailing to the next on the same ship. This was a get off, your time is up cruise end.
Today is Saturday, 2/5/2005
We have dinner in The Grand Dining Room again. I forgot to photograph half the courses and couldn't tell you now what they were. I will say that during the evenings, the white wine that was being poured, in no particular order, was Sancerre, French Chardonnay, Pinot Grigio, either Pouilly-Fuisse or Fume, can't remember now. This is what comes of doing this from random slips of paper and not keeping a diary on the laptop. Oh, well, suffice it to say that we liked all the white wines and as usual for us did not drink any of the reds. Also, while Debbie has a limited number of foods she finds acceptable, it looks like she ate a month's worth of filet mignon in 3 nights. She was happy to find that a peppercorn sauce was offered with her steak each time, but sour cream, chives, etc. for her potato offered only 1 out of 3 times. She still came home a pound lighter than when she left. I did not weigh before or after, too much information and all.
We start to watch the movie on TV, "Windtalkers" which we have not seen before but, I fell asleep and Debbie said it was a war movie, she did not like and she went to sleep too. We are almost all packed up and we have an early morning tomorrow.
Some cruises end with a feeling of, your time is up and you need to get out of here and some don't. We have seen both kinds and it seems to vary not only by line but by ship and even from one sailing to the next on the same ship. This was a get off, your time is up cruise end.
St. Thomas afternoon
St. Thomas afternoon
Today is Saturday, 2/5/2005
Arrived back at Diamond and ready for some lunch. The Grill is a Mexican Buffet today. We went up and nothing really looked good to either of us. We will finally have lunch in the Grand Dining Room. We get a table by the big windows and can watch small sightseeing boats come and go from the dock.
After lunch we stroll around the Havensight Mall and up and down the dock. I checked cameras here too, same stuff with higher prices than St. Maarten. The cab drivers have both said that there are 5 ships in town today and that Charlotte Amalie is a zoo. We decide that we definitely do not need to partake of that. We go in and work on the jigsaw puzzle some more, and do some packing. Debbie wants to go to the Chocoholic Tea this afternoon and we have signed up for and received our invitation to the Galley Tour. The tour is at 4pm and the Chocoholic Tea is from 4-5pm.
We are met outside The Grand Dining Room by Executive Chef Rolando Cornejo with champagne and started the Galley Tour just off The Grand Dining Room on Deck 8. This is the prep kitchen and where they prepare room service meals. Then we go down one level to the pastry kitchen and refrigerators. He only unlooks the vegetable refrigeration room for us to look in. Debbie sees the first raspberries of the cruise in the dessert area of the pastry kitchen. We then we go down one more level to the working kitchen. They are preparing the dinner for the crew. They tell us that they are making chicken and rice for the Filipinos and roast beef for the Europeans. Rolando tells us the food service and food and beverage servers personnel are all Filipino. He is asked about the menus and is a little vague but appears to be saying that he gets menus from corporate, and he orders provisions from the master on the ship and the orders are done locally. He is asked how often he repeats menus, to our shock he replies every 14 days. He is asked if this is true and longer cruises and replies, yes. Debbie is incredulous. She jumps in and asks him specifically about the World Cruise, if we sail for 122 nights, we will repeat the menus every 14 days, he is firm in replying yes, the menus will always repeat every 14 days. We are both stunned. We cruised for 45-days on Orient Lines' old Crown Odyssey and never once repeated a menu, though we did repeat about 6 different dishes for a couple of times, we never repeated an entire menu. We did not think OrientLines were really a class act compared to RSSC, but if Rolando is correct, we will have to reevaluate our opinions of both lines. He was firm in his reply. He opened a door to release us and we found ourselves by the gangway entrance on Deck 6. It is a 3-story kitchen.
We are off to the Chocoholic Tea. We enjoyed the grape and banana skewers dipped in chocolate the best.
We go back to the room and pick out final outfits so we can continue with the packing. We shower and watch the sailaway from our balcony and are ready for dinner.
Today is Saturday, 2/5/2005
Arrived back at Diamond and ready for some lunch. The Grill is a Mexican Buffet today. We went up and nothing really looked good to either of us. We will finally have lunch in the Grand Dining Room. We get a table by the big windows and can watch small sightseeing boats come and go from the dock.
After lunch we stroll around the Havensight Mall and up and down the dock. I checked cameras here too, same stuff with higher prices than St. Maarten. The cab drivers have both said that there are 5 ships in town today and that Charlotte Amalie is a zoo. We decide that we definitely do not need to partake of that. We go in and work on the jigsaw puzzle some more, and do some packing. Debbie wants to go to the Chocoholic Tea this afternoon and we have signed up for and received our invitation to the Galley Tour. The tour is at 4pm and the Chocoholic Tea is from 4-5pm.
We are met outside The Grand Dining Room by Executive Chef Rolando Cornejo with champagne and started the Galley Tour just off The Grand Dining Room on Deck 8. This is the prep kitchen and where they prepare room service meals. Then we go down one level to the pastry kitchen and refrigerators. He only unlooks the vegetable refrigeration room for us to look in. Debbie sees the first raspberries of the cruise in the dessert area of the pastry kitchen. We then we go down one more level to the working kitchen. They are preparing the dinner for the crew. They tell us that they are making chicken and rice for the Filipinos and roast beef for the Europeans. Rolando tells us the food service and food and beverage servers personnel are all Filipino. He is asked about the menus and is a little vague but appears to be saying that he gets menus from corporate, and he orders provisions from the master on the ship and the orders are done locally. He is asked how often he repeats menus, to our shock he replies every 14 days. He is asked if this is true and longer cruises and replies, yes. Debbie is incredulous. She jumps in and asks him specifically about the World Cruise, if we sail for 122 nights, we will repeat the menus every 14 days, he is firm in replying yes, the menus will always repeat every 14 days. We are both stunned. We cruised for 45-days on Orient Lines' old Crown Odyssey and never once repeated a menu, though we did repeat about 6 different dishes for a couple of times, we never repeated an entire menu. We did not think OrientLines were really a class act compared to RSSC, but if Rolando is correct, we will have to reevaluate our opinions of both lines. He was firm in his reply. He opened a door to release us and we found ourselves by the gangway entrance on Deck 6. It is a 3-story kitchen.
We are off to the Chocoholic Tea. We enjoyed the grape and banana skewers dipped in chocolate the best.
We go back to the room and pick out final outfits so we can continue with the packing. We shower and watch the sailaway from our balcony and are ready for dinner.
St. Thomas morning
St. Thomas morning
Today is Saturday, 2/5/2005
I was up at my ordinary pre-dawn hour, but with no treadmill, no laptop and not wanting to inhale the ship's exhaust on the track, I am out of luck for my usual activities.
I am back to the room to get Debbie out of bed and in the shower before room service breakfast is to be delivered. We have arrived and docked early and we both slept soundly, so if there was anything going on last night we could not report on it.
Room service is on time and Debbie is fed and dressed by the time they call us to the Constellation Center to collect our passports and clear Immigrations individually. The Center is right off the atrium outside our cabin door and we are the first ones there.
We go back to the cabin and watch the dock area wake up and plan our day. This is the only place where Debbie has something big she would like to do. Sea Trekkin' at Coral World. We both love aquariums/marine parks so this should be fun. I am not too sure about the helmut diving, but the one time Debbie ever took a vacation without me, she went to Bermuda and came back with nothing but a t-shirt for me, a tan and one Polaroid of her holding a big fish on the bottom of the ocean with a big smile on her face and a big helmut on her head! (You have to know Debbie to know how out of character all of this was, flying alone, riding in a small boat, and getting in the ocean! She is terrified of fish, when she showed me that Polaroid, I asked where is the guy holding the gun to your head to force you to do that, she smiled and said, just out of camera range. What the....? She never went on vacation without me again, anyway.) So, if she could do helmut diving, so can I. We get our suits on under our clothes and head out. We get another shared cab/van here and off we go. We arrive at Coral World after an exhilarating van ride, up, down, sideways, hairpin turns, ruts, pot holes, flooded streets, I am not sure we will ever get where she expects to go, but she is following along on her map and shows me the route as the we change route #s and she cranks up her Relief Band. We pay admission to Coral World and not Sea Trekkin' because she says they are not answering the phone. We go out to the undersea observatory and go down to view all the views and come back up and still no one is there for the Sea Trekkin'. We start to walk back to the front gate and we meet a woman on the bridge and ask her, she says Sea Trekkin' is cancelled due to rough water. Phew, I am relieved because I thought the fish were swimming backwards through those undersea windows, until Debbie pointed out they were being swept forward and back past the window by the water! I was worried, but they are don't so I don't have to either. Debbie seems disappointed. But, she rapidly checks her Coral World handout and tells me we are in time to see the feeding at the Caribbean Reef Encounter and leads the way. It is very interesting, not too busy and we get to speak with a couple of the aquarists.We go check out the ray pool, sea turtle pool, then go to the shark feeding. It is too hot, full sun and too many little kids, we leave pretty quickly and head for the Marine Gardens. It is a pair of buildings filled with small display aquarium tanks, we see sea horses, jawfish that dig holes with their shovel jaws to attract a mate, anemones, eels, and one room of fluorescent sea life blacklit. We really like it. The next 2 feedings were cancelled because of the rough water. So, we finished up the park, put our stuff in a locker here and walked over to the beach for a while. I went in and Debbie did not, it was really rough. We sat on the beach while I sundried and then went back over and I showered off and changed and we caught a cab back to the pier.
Again, it was a shared van. There were already 6 people in there, 4 going to the cruise ship docks and 2 going to the Ritz Carlton. So, this meant for the same low $7 per head price we got a circle tour of the entire eastern end of the island. It was another exhilarating ride but we were prepared this time.
Today is Saturday, 2/5/2005
I was up at my ordinary pre-dawn hour, but with no treadmill, no laptop and not wanting to inhale the ship's exhaust on the track, I am out of luck for my usual activities.
I am back to the room to get Debbie out of bed and in the shower before room service breakfast is to be delivered. We have arrived and docked early and we both slept soundly, so if there was anything going on last night we could not report on it.
Room service is on time and Debbie is fed and dressed by the time they call us to the Constellation Center to collect our passports and clear Immigrations individually. The Center is right off the atrium outside our cabin door and we are the first ones there.
We go back to the cabin and watch the dock area wake up and plan our day. This is the only place where Debbie has something big she would like to do. Sea Trekkin' at Coral World. We both love aquariums/marine parks so this should be fun. I am not too sure about the helmut diving, but the one time Debbie ever took a vacation without me, she went to Bermuda and came back with nothing but a t-shirt for me, a tan and one Polaroid of her holding a big fish on the bottom of the ocean with a big smile on her face and a big helmut on her head! (You have to know Debbie to know how out of character all of this was, flying alone, riding in a small boat, and getting in the ocean! She is terrified of fish, when she showed me that Polaroid, I asked where is the guy holding the gun to your head to force you to do that, she smiled and said, just out of camera range. What the....? She never went on vacation without me again, anyway.) So, if she could do helmut diving, so can I. We get our suits on under our clothes and head out. We get another shared cab/van here and off we go. We arrive at Coral World after an exhilarating van ride, up, down, sideways, hairpin turns, ruts, pot holes, flooded streets, I am not sure we will ever get where she expects to go, but she is following along on her map and shows me the route as the we change route #s and she cranks up her Relief Band. We pay admission to Coral World and not Sea Trekkin' because she says they are not answering the phone. We go out to the undersea observatory and go down to view all the views and come back up and still no one is there for the Sea Trekkin'. We start to walk back to the front gate and we meet a woman on the bridge and ask her, she says Sea Trekkin' is cancelled due to rough water. Phew, I am relieved because I thought the fish were swimming backwards through those undersea windows, until Debbie pointed out they were being swept forward and back past the window by the water! I was worried, but they are don't so I don't have to either. Debbie seems disappointed. But, she rapidly checks her Coral World handout and tells me we are in time to see the feeding at the Caribbean Reef Encounter and leads the way. It is very interesting, not too busy and we get to speak with a couple of the aquarists.We go check out the ray pool, sea turtle pool, then go to the shark feeding. It is too hot, full sun and too many little kids, we leave pretty quickly and head for the Marine Gardens. It is a pair of buildings filled with small display aquarium tanks, we see sea horses, jawfish that dig holes with their shovel jaws to attract a mate, anemones, eels, and one room of fluorescent sea life blacklit. We really like it. The next 2 feedings were cancelled because of the rough water. So, we finished up the park, put our stuff in a locker here and walked over to the beach for a while. I went in and Debbie did not, it was really rough. We sat on the beach while I sundried and then went back over and I showered off and changed and we caught a cab back to the pier.
Again, it was a shared van. There were already 6 people in there, 4 going to the cruise ship docks and 2 going to the Ritz Carlton. So, this meant for the same low $7 per head price we got a circle tour of the entire eastern end of the island. It was another exhilarating ride but we were prepared this time.
St. Maarten evening
Today is Friday, 2/4/2005
We return to the cabin to deposit our T-shirts, there is still a line to get into the Windows Lounge, so we go back to The Grand Dining Room and just wait in line there. We suffer smoke inhalation for the first time. The wait is mercifully brief. We are seating in the main part of the dining room for the first time for dinner tonight. It is a little noisier here, or maybe because there are so many more people dining in The Grand Dining Room tonight for the Captain's Welcome Dinner. They are serving caviar and lobster tonight and there are several large tables with staff and officers at them tonight. We cannot judge the noise level because we have not seen this many people in the dining room before tonight and it is our first dinner in the main room.
I forgot to photograph dessert, but Debbie had a decaf cappucino (she saw it on the menu for the first time tonight, she has not been fond of the regular coffee) and creme brulee, I had a trio of ice creams. She did not care for the creme brulee or she is just getting too queasy. I finished it off for her. She commented that it was all about the brulee, I did not understand, and she pointed out that it was the thinnest layer of creme she had ever seen in a creme brulee, so the focus was on the brulee. I didn't notice, but yep, she's right, only about a 1/4 inch of custard.
Tomorrow is an early morning for St. Thomas and we are both hoping for a good night's sleep. We filled out a room service order for our wake up call. Tonight's movie is "Vanity Fair" and I fall asleep pretty quickly, Debbie stays up past 11:30 to see the whole thing. I am getting back to my normal sleep pattern of early to bed and very early to rise.
St. Maarten afternoon
St. Maarten sunset
Today is Friday, 2/4/2005
When we get back, it is almost noon and our cabin has still not been made up. We drop our purchases and go work on the jigsaw puzzle until lunch time. Today is an Asian buffet at The Grill and that is where we head. I forgot my camera again, so no pictures. I don't really remember what we had.
We went back down to the cabin and it is made up by one. We brushed our teeth again, slathered on sunscreen and changed into bathing suits and went up to the pool with a book for Debbie and napping for me. There were fewer than a dozen people around the pool while we were there for about 1 1/2 hours. We were there from about 1:30PM to 3PM. After about an hour we were both hot and parched. We had both seen 2 different people get up and go to the Splash Bar and request a drink and take it back to their chaise. Debbie asked me if I would like a drink, she would go get it. I told her I felt like something really cold and she said she was going to ask for a banana milkshake and asked me if I would like a virgin Pina Colada. I would not and I do not want a milkshake. I tell her to order me a virgin peach daiquiri. There have 4 employees at the bar during this hour and none have come out and asked if anyone at the pool would like a drink. This does not seem right, but we have seen 2 other people go up and take drinks back to their chairs, so what do we know. Debbie goes up and sits down and waits. Eventually, some one walks by from the bridge area and tells the 4 they have a customer waiting. A young man comes over behind the bar and asks her what she wants. She points to me and tells him, my husband and I are sitting over there and I would like a banana milkshake and he would like....He interrupts her and says I can't do that, I don't have any bananas. She is speechless. She tells me that she just stared like a dog at the giant bunch of bananas 6 feet from him. He finally follows her gaze and laughs, oh I guess there are bananas. She continues, that her husband would like a virgin peach daiquiri. He tells her no he can't do that because like he was telling her, he has no fruit. She tells him and we have established that you do in fact have fruit. He offers to make a frozen virgin Pina Colada for me, her head almost explodes, but she will not argue for a daiquiri for me. She tells me she has had enough, between the Eggs Benedict, waiting outside to get the room made up, now this, I can't do anymore today, I won't. Drink it or don't. She sits and waits for the drinks and brings them back over to our chaises, the young man doesn't not offer to deliver them to us. When he picked up the big jug of Pina Colada mix, she says the the jug immediately behind it was clearly strawberry daiquiri mix and she would be willing to bet that one of the other 4 jugs in the well was peach daiquiri mix and I am welcome to go over and pick my own battle. But, she is right, I will not go and engage in a confrontation for a beverage on vacation. We drink our drinks, people go, new people come, the 4 bar employees stay in the shade behind the bar talking and laughing among themselves. As we start to pack it in at 3PM, a young woman comes out from behind the bar and makes the round of the chaises offering drinks or refills, but we have had enough sun and we decline.
Debbie is in for a shower and a nap, she is exhausted from last night. I decide that I can't take anymore sun on our balcony and I have napped enough by the pool and I shower and go work on the jigsaw puzzle inside. There is an Italian Ice Cream Social at 4pm. I go alone, then wake Debbie around 5:30pm to see us leave the dock.
We work on the jigsaw puzzle together some and then go to our balcony to watch Diamond prepare to leave. There is a problem, a couple are not on board. At last, they arrive, but now there is another problem, the winch/or winch motor that raises the gangway will not work. With the ship bobbing up and down, the gangway has been screeching on the concrete dock all day. It is right under our balcony. Debbie did not nap well because of the screeching through the closed door and drapes. Now there are a man and a woman down there in a golf cart to see us off and the man is cursing a blue streak and yelling that we need to get off his GD dock and how p**d off about the holes we have dug in his dock. Well. We were to have sailed at 6 and it is at least 6:30 before they get the gangway raised. The next day in St. Thomas we saw them using a hoist to raise a new motor out of Diamond's dingy, so guess they had to replace the winch motor for the gangway. We went up top to get a closer look at the winch situation, but did not see what magic they worked to finally winch the gangway up. While we were up there we wandered on up to the bridge to see us sailaway, but it got really windy so we didn't stay long. Tonight is the captain's reception and we go down, but there is a big line and we decide not to stand in it because the ship is starting to move around alot and Debbie is afraid to push the limits too far. We head back downstairs and see the shop open for the first time. We go in and each get a "Diamond 05" T-shirt. I guess these will soon be valuable collector's items.
Today is Friday, 2/4/2005
When we get back, it is almost noon and our cabin has still not been made up. We drop our purchases and go work on the jigsaw puzzle until lunch time. Today is an Asian buffet at The Grill and that is where we head. I forgot my camera again, so no pictures. I don't really remember what we had.
We went back down to the cabin and it is made up by one. We brushed our teeth again, slathered on sunscreen and changed into bathing suits and went up to the pool with a book for Debbie and napping for me. There were fewer than a dozen people around the pool while we were there for about 1 1/2 hours. We were there from about 1:30PM to 3PM. After about an hour we were both hot and parched. We had both seen 2 different people get up and go to the Splash Bar and request a drink and take it back to their chaise. Debbie asked me if I would like a drink, she would go get it. I told her I felt like something really cold and she said she was going to ask for a banana milkshake and asked me if I would like a virgin Pina Colada. I would not and I do not want a milkshake. I tell her to order me a virgin peach daiquiri. There have 4 employees at the bar during this hour and none have come out and asked if anyone at the pool would like a drink. This does not seem right, but we have seen 2 other people go up and take drinks back to their chairs, so what do we know. Debbie goes up and sits down and waits. Eventually, some one walks by from the bridge area and tells the 4 they have a customer waiting. A young man comes over behind the bar and asks her what she wants. She points to me and tells him, my husband and I are sitting over there and I would like a banana milkshake and he would like....He interrupts her and says I can't do that, I don't have any bananas. She is speechless. She tells me that she just stared like a dog at the giant bunch of bananas 6 feet from him. He finally follows her gaze and laughs, oh I guess there are bananas. She continues, that her husband would like a virgin peach daiquiri. He tells her no he can't do that because like he was telling her, he has no fruit. She tells him and we have established that you do in fact have fruit. He offers to make a frozen virgin Pina Colada for me, her head almost explodes, but she will not argue for a daiquiri for me. She tells me she has had enough, between the Eggs Benedict, waiting outside to get the room made up, now this, I can't do anymore today, I won't. Drink it or don't. She sits and waits for the drinks and brings them back over to our chaises, the young man doesn't not offer to deliver them to us. When he picked up the big jug of Pina Colada mix, she says the the jug immediately behind it was clearly strawberry daiquiri mix and she would be willing to bet that one of the other 4 jugs in the well was peach daiquiri mix and I am welcome to go over and pick my own battle. But, she is right, I will not go and engage in a confrontation for a beverage on vacation. We drink our drinks, people go, new people come, the 4 bar employees stay in the shade behind the bar talking and laughing among themselves. As we start to pack it in at 3PM, a young woman comes out from behind the bar and makes the round of the chaises offering drinks or refills, but we have had enough sun and we decline.
Debbie is in for a shower and a nap, she is exhausted from last night. I decide that I can't take anymore sun on our balcony and I have napped enough by the pool and I shower and go work on the jigsaw puzzle inside. There is an Italian Ice Cream Social at 4pm. I go alone, then wake Debbie around 5:30pm to see us leave the dock.
We work on the jigsaw puzzle together some and then go to our balcony to watch Diamond prepare to leave. There is a problem, a couple are not on board. At last, they arrive, but now there is another problem, the winch/or winch motor that raises the gangway will not work. With the ship bobbing up and down, the gangway has been screeching on the concrete dock all day. It is right under our balcony. Debbie did not nap well because of the screeching through the closed door and drapes. Now there are a man and a woman down there in a golf cart to see us off and the man is cursing a blue streak and yelling that we need to get off his GD dock and how p**d off about the holes we have dug in his dock. Well. We were to have sailed at 6 and it is at least 6:30 before they get the gangway raised. The next day in St. Thomas we saw them using a hoist to raise a new motor out of Diamond's dingy, so guess they had to replace the winch motor for the gangway. We went up top to get a closer look at the winch situation, but did not see what magic they worked to finally winch the gangway up. While we were up there we wandered on up to the bridge to see us sailaway, but it got really windy so we didn't stay long. Tonight is the captain's reception and we go down, but there is a big line and we decide not to stand in it because the ship is starting to move around alot and Debbie is afraid to push the limits too far. We head back downstairs and see the shop open for the first time. We go in and each get a "Diamond 05" T-shirt. I guess these will soon be valuable collector's items.
St. Maarten morning
Morning Photos
Today is Friday, 2/4/2005
So, we walk through the shops at the dock area. This is a very clean and pleasant shopping area, they have a steel band playing right at the entrance to the pier. It is a very festive and welcoming environment they have built here. Every thing looks brand new, clean and shiny; maybe it is brand new.
I do not find a camera that I want to buy. I am shopping for a new one for the world cruise. I want more than 4x optical zoom and I also want it smaller and lighter than the Olympus I am using now. This may be a hard combination to find, but I have months, so I can keep looking.
That done we get in a cab line. We get jammed full-in, 14 to a van, for a $3/pp, 3 minute ride to the absolute closest point on Front St. to the docks. When we were approached by the people making cab assignments, Debbie told them we wanted to go to the museum and each of the 3 people involved, said yes, Front St. OK. We can walk, it is just the principle of the thing. But, everyone is grumbling, they got dumped where they did not ask to go. Now we know how it works from the docks, but there did not appear to be any other option than walking because the water taxis are not running today.
We find a T-shirt shop fairly quickly and I get 2 for me and 1 for the guy who drove us to the airport and Debbie finds one with a map of the Caribbean on it. 4 for $14, good deal, we got all the right sizes and all are 100% cotton. Debbie is looking for something for birthday presents for the 2 boys who are growing up next door to us. She finds some beach towel/beach bag things in the openair market and we think they will be good for them, we know they visit their grandfather at the beach. We look and look for the museum, we have the address from 2 sources and it is shown in the same spot on 2 different maps, but we do not find it where it should be, nor do we stumble on it anywhere else! Mystery. Two days, two museums not seen. We do walk over to the beach and it looks very nice but I am not willing to go to the ship and back to here to enjoy it. We agree we will spend some time at the ship's pool this afternoon. We walk around a bit more, walk through a casino and decide that we have seen enough. It is very sunny and hot and crowded here today. We take a cab alone back to the ship for the same price as the ride over.
Today is Friday, 2/4/2005
So, we walk through the shops at the dock area. This is a very clean and pleasant shopping area, they have a steel band playing right at the entrance to the pier. It is a very festive and welcoming environment they have built here. Every thing looks brand new, clean and shiny; maybe it is brand new.
I do not find a camera that I want to buy. I am shopping for a new one for the world cruise. I want more than 4x optical zoom and I also want it smaller and lighter than the Olympus I am using now. This may be a hard combination to find, but I have months, so I can keep looking.
That done we get in a cab line. We get jammed full-in, 14 to a van, for a $3/pp, 3 minute ride to the absolute closest point on Front St. to the docks. When we were approached by the people making cab assignments, Debbie told them we wanted to go to the museum and each of the 3 people involved, said yes, Front St. OK. We can walk, it is just the principle of the thing. But, everyone is grumbling, they got dumped where they did not ask to go. Now we know how it works from the docks, but there did not appear to be any other option than walking because the water taxis are not running today.
We find a T-shirt shop fairly quickly and I get 2 for me and 1 for the guy who drove us to the airport and Debbie finds one with a map of the Caribbean on it. 4 for $14, good deal, we got all the right sizes and all are 100% cotton. Debbie is looking for something for birthday presents for the 2 boys who are growing up next door to us. She finds some beach towel/beach bag things in the openair market and we think they will be good for them, we know they visit their grandfather at the beach. We look and look for the museum, we have the address from 2 sources and it is shown in the same spot on 2 different maps, but we do not find it where it should be, nor do we stumble on it anywhere else! Mystery. Two days, two museums not seen. We do walk over to the beach and it looks very nice but I am not willing to go to the ship and back to here to enjoy it. We agree we will spend some time at the ship's pool this afternoon. We walk around a bit more, walk through a casino and decide that we have seen enough. It is very sunny and hot and crowded here today. We take a cab alone back to the ship for the same price as the ride over.
Docking in St. Maarten
Docking Photos
Today is Friday, 2/4/2005
The schedule says that we may dock or anchor here so I am up early to see which it will be. We are not moving at all when I get up and I see the pilot arrive and we sit awhile longer, I guess they are deciding what it will be. Eventually the pilot takes us in a big circle and then tries to back up to going down the dock, he pulls back and out and repeats. Finally we are tied up, but it is rough in the harbor and we are bobbing up & down. A much larger ship is moving in behind us now, so that may be contributing to the bobbing, hopefully when the huge ship is tied up, that will block us from some of the swells. But, it doesn't.
I go in to wake Debbie up. She plans to special order the Eggs Benedict this morning and we will be able to just walk ashore. Good. I open the curtains and Debbie groans and growls, please God let us stop sailing in circles. I laugh, how could she know about that when I know she was asleep? I tell her that we only made 2 circles. (She is not a morning person.) She barks back, no we've been circling and doing lazy eights all night! What? She tells me to go out to the atrium and she how far we traveled from 11pm last night to whenever we stopped moving this morning. She is right, it is about 1/2 inch on the map. It would not take all night, and yet with the bed vibrating all night, clearly we were under power and sailing. She agrees with me, the bed vibrated and we were looping around for hours. I thought the bed vibrating was annoying enough, but apparently she also felt every turn. Neither of us got much rest last night, I was happy to have napped and gone to sleep early yesterday. Debbie is a little grumpy.
She hurries up, we exchange the Privacy for the Service Please sign on our door, and we are the 3rd couple seated in The Grand Dining Room right by the window at the rear. Debbie asks if she can have Eggs Benedict even though they are not on the menu. The waiter discourages her. She questions him, he says they have no hollandaise, they will have to make it just for her. She tells him to do that then, he says she will have to wait at least 20 minutes and he is sure she does not want to do that. (rut-roh) She assures him that she has the whole day cleared before her to wait for her Eggs Benedict for just as long as it takes. They have some more conversation about english muffins and canadian bacon, yes, he agrees with her that these are components of the Eggs Benedict so she does need additional bread or meat. How runny should the yolks be? (What the heck? It is just Eggs Benedict. These better be the most perfect Eggs Benedict that have ever been served to her.) The waiter turns to me (double rut-roh) and says this means I will have to wait too. I tell him, I am with her, do what you have to do, we aren't going anywhere. So, it is clear that we do not mind waiting. BUT, they do not serve the other 2 couples either until they serve us! They were not happy, at least one couple was renting a car here and anxious to get going. Oh, well, we did not request that they hold breakfast for everyone before us.
Debbie has heard a lot about the Eggs Benedict on RSSC and they are a favorite special breakfast treat for her, so she has really been looking forward to this. She has never read anywhere that standard order of Eggs Benedict, which it is more than clear she ordered since the 2 of them discussed the entire ingredients list, etc., comes topped with caviar! She would never eat caviar. When the dish is finally delivered with a big dollop of fish eggs on top each, we just look at each other in horror and then break out in giggles. I make her wait for me to take a picture. She says this can't be kosher, mixing species' eggs. This should never happen. We are scrapping them off (while trying to leave some hardwon hollandaise behind) when the waiter reappears to ask what our problem is. She tells him, you didn't mention the caviar. He tells her it is standard on all orders of Eggs Benedict, whatever. After discussing every aspect of the ingredients and preparation of Eggs Benedict with her, while trying to dissuade her, he might have thrown that little tidbit of information in, but she'll eat them anyway. We finished breakfast, walked down to the Tour Desk to pick up today's map and went back in to look at the navigation chart together. We see that the Service Please sign is still on the door, weird, we spoke to Alina on our way out and we were gone over an hour.
We put the Privacy sign back up and discuss our plan. I want to comparison price digital cameras here, get a T-shirt and just look around. Debbie wants to go to the museum. Debbie suggests going to the beach, but I don't want to. While we sit on the balcony looking through the information she has brought from online, Fodor's, Frommer's, Ngaire, etc., we hear the public announcement that the local authorities have suspended the water taxi service for the day because of the rough water. We had been watching them bounce around out there and it was clear when we left that it would be a land taxi for us. We brushed our teeth, put the Service Please sign back up and headed out for the morning
Today is Friday, 2/4/2005
The schedule says that we may dock or anchor here so I am up early to see which it will be. We are not moving at all when I get up and I see the pilot arrive and we sit awhile longer, I guess they are deciding what it will be. Eventually the pilot takes us in a big circle and then tries to back up to going down the dock, he pulls back and out and repeats. Finally we are tied up, but it is rough in the harbor and we are bobbing up & down. A much larger ship is moving in behind us now, so that may be contributing to the bobbing, hopefully when the huge ship is tied up, that will block us from some of the swells. But, it doesn't.
I go in to wake Debbie up. She plans to special order the Eggs Benedict this morning and we will be able to just walk ashore. Good. I open the curtains and Debbie groans and growls, please God let us stop sailing in circles. I laugh, how could she know about that when I know she was asleep? I tell her that we only made 2 circles. (She is not a morning person.) She barks back, no we've been circling and doing lazy eights all night! What? She tells me to go out to the atrium and she how far we traveled from 11pm last night to whenever we stopped moving this morning. She is right, it is about 1/2 inch on the map. It would not take all night, and yet with the bed vibrating all night, clearly we were under power and sailing. She agrees with me, the bed vibrated and we were looping around for hours. I thought the bed vibrating was annoying enough, but apparently she also felt every turn. Neither of us got much rest last night, I was happy to have napped and gone to sleep early yesterday. Debbie is a little grumpy.
She hurries up, we exchange the Privacy for the Service Please sign on our door, and we are the 3rd couple seated in The Grand Dining Room right by the window at the rear. Debbie asks if she can have Eggs Benedict even though they are not on the menu. The waiter discourages her. She questions him, he says they have no hollandaise, they will have to make it just for her. She tells him to do that then, he says she will have to wait at least 20 minutes and he is sure she does not want to do that. (rut-roh) She assures him that she has the whole day cleared before her to wait for her Eggs Benedict for just as long as it takes. They have some more conversation about english muffins and canadian bacon, yes, he agrees with her that these are components of the Eggs Benedict so she does need additional bread or meat. How runny should the yolks be? (What the heck? It is just Eggs Benedict. These better be the most perfect Eggs Benedict that have ever been served to her.) The waiter turns to me (double rut-roh) and says this means I will have to wait too. I tell him, I am with her, do what you have to do, we aren't going anywhere. So, it is clear that we do not mind waiting. BUT, they do not serve the other 2 couples either until they serve us! They were not happy, at least one couple was renting a car here and anxious to get going. Oh, well, we did not request that they hold breakfast for everyone before us.
Debbie has heard a lot about the Eggs Benedict on RSSC and they are a favorite special breakfast treat for her, so she has really been looking forward to this. She has never read anywhere that standard order of Eggs Benedict, which it is more than clear she ordered since the 2 of them discussed the entire ingredients list, etc., comes topped with caviar! She would never eat caviar. When the dish is finally delivered with a big dollop of fish eggs on top each, we just look at each other in horror and then break out in giggles. I make her wait for me to take a picture. She says this can't be kosher, mixing species' eggs. This should never happen. We are scrapping them off (while trying to leave some hardwon hollandaise behind) when the waiter reappears to ask what our problem is. She tells him, you didn't mention the caviar. He tells her it is standard on all orders of Eggs Benedict, whatever. After discussing every aspect of the ingredients and preparation of Eggs Benedict with her, while trying to dissuade her, he might have thrown that little tidbit of information in, but she'll eat them anyway. We finished breakfast, walked down to the Tour Desk to pick up today's map and went back in to look at the navigation chart together. We see that the Service Please sign is still on the door, weird, we spoke to Alina on our way out and we were gone over an hour.
We put the Privacy sign back up and discuss our plan. I want to comparison price digital cameras here, get a T-shirt and just look around. Debbie wants to go to the museum. Debbie suggests going to the beach, but I don't want to. While we sit on the balcony looking through the information she has brought from online, Fodor's, Frommer's, Ngaire, etc., we hear the public announcement that the local authorities have suspended the water taxi service for the day because of the rough water. We had been watching them bounce around out there and it was clear when we left that it would be a land taxi for us. We brushed our teeth, put the Service Please sign back up and headed out for the morning
Dinner off St. Barts
Dinner Photos
Today is Thur. 2/3/05
Dinner again at 7:30pm. We are seated in the small room to the left of the entrance as opposed to last night when we were seated in the small room to the right. There is a much bigger crowd tonight. I think a lot of people did not come to dinner last night because it was so rough, but tonight we are sitting still off St. Barts until 11pm. Since Debbie is on her feet, we hope to watch tonight's movie on TV in our cabin, "Stage Beauty," which we have not seen before.
We were just finishing up our main course about 9PM, so we Debbie suggested that we leave and our room service for dessert and our movie. Excellent suggestion. That is what we did. I forgot to take any pictures, but we checked the dessert menu on our way to the cabin and there was nothing Debbie wanted anyway. So, I ordered pistachio ice cream and Debbie ordered hot chocolate and a plate of the little treats we would have gotten had we stayed at the table. We were both satisfied and pleased to enjoy our sweets at our leisure in bathrobes in front of the TV. That love seat is very uncomfortable though. I fell asleep but Debbie watched the whole movie and liked it. It was over about 11:30pm.
Debbie reported that we headed out to St. Maarten at about 11pm as scheduled. I don't know when it started but the bed vibrated like magic fingers, hard, all night long. I got up early, I couldn't take it anymore.
Today is Thur. 2/3/05
Dinner again at 7:30pm. We are seated in the small room to the left of the entrance as opposed to last night when we were seated in the small room to the right. There is a much bigger crowd tonight. I think a lot of people did not come to dinner last night because it was so rough, but tonight we are sitting still off St. Barts until 11pm. Since Debbie is on her feet, we hope to watch tonight's movie on TV in our cabin, "Stage Beauty," which we have not seen before.
We were just finishing up our main course about 9PM, so we Debbie suggested that we leave and our room service for dessert and our movie. Excellent suggestion. That is what we did. I forgot to take any pictures, but we checked the dessert menu on our way to the cabin and there was nothing Debbie wanted anyway. So, I ordered pistachio ice cream and Debbie ordered hot chocolate and a plate of the little treats we would have gotten had we stayed at the table. We were both satisfied and pleased to enjoy our sweets at our leisure in bathrobes in front of the TV. That love seat is very uncomfortable though. I fell asleep but Debbie watched the whole movie and liked it. It was over about 11:30pm.
Debbie reported that we headed out to St. Maarten at about 11pm as scheduled. I don't know when it started but the bed vibrated like magic fingers, hard, all night long. I got up early, I couldn't take it anymore.
Wednesday, February 9, 2005
St. Barts
St. Barts Photos
Today is Thurs. 2/3/05.
Debbie slept in and took her time getting her sea legs this morning. I feel bad that the seas did not calm as the Filipinos had told her to expect. She tells me that they did! She says that between 11:30 and midnight it got calm, but by 3AM it got rough again. Oh, well. We walked up to the bridge as we were nearing Gustavia, that is a nice touch, keeping the doors open. I did not realize that we could come & go there until Debbie assured me that Diamond was known for this. I did not hear the anchor go down, but we appear to be drifting around it a mile or 2 from Gustavia. According to my reading of the map and the landmarks I can see, we are anchored between Gustavia and Colombier. I can see the end of the island sometimes and all the rocks with breakers which is labeled Petit Jean. Debbie says she thinks the crescent shaped beach in front of us is Corossol. We would need binoculars to actually see Gustavia from here. Not looking forward to that tender ride, but it is not too good out here either so I think we will go ashore. We timed the first 2 tenders and they took about 10 minutes to load and then 12-15 minutes until they were out of sight in the moored sailboats off Gustavia's harbor.
We had breakfast in The Grand Dining Room but I forgot my camera. I had lamb chops and fried eggs. Ngaire is right RSSC has delicious baby lamb chops and I am not even a big fan of lamb and never had it for breakfast before, but I could get used to it. Debbie had french toast. She did not get enough syrup and thought they should leave the little pitcher at the table for her to serve herself as needed. Good idea. We took things slow, wandered around the ship some more, worked on the jigsaw puzzle in the atrium outside our cabin and then went to lunch. We had lunch at The Grill. I went out to the barbecue on deck and had mixed meat and vegetables with a salad. Debbie stayed with the indoor buffet selections and had a cup of creamy herb soup with some crackers and then tried the pasta station. The cook there fixed her penne Alfredo and then convinced her that it would go very well with the roast pork loin at the adjacent carving station, so between the 2 she got a full plate and ate it all. They were pouring white wine at the deck barbecue but we opted for diet coke and coke instead. Something fizzy felt good on the stomach about now. We heard the PA announcement the the catamaran tour has been canceled. Rough seas?
Debbie has read that things close in Gustavia between noon and 2PM. Since we did not start tendering until after 11AM we are killing time to tender closer to 2PM. We plan to walk around the harbor area at a leisurely pace and then visit the Musee de Saint-Barth. We arrive at the Musee about 5 minutes early, we sit outside through one of the intermittent rain showers for about15 minutes. Debbie gets up to read the sign. It is in French, it has been awhile but she translates it, Closed all afternoon on Weds. only. Closed noon to 2 every other day. We give up and go get me an ice cream cone. After we get to the other side of the harbor again, Debbie sees that the museum doors are open and much, much later we laugh ourselves silly when we realize that Debbie does know the days of the week in French as she recited from memory to me what was on the sign, but that we did not know what day of the week it was. Today is not Weds., it is Thurs.! How goofy are we? A few days on vacation and we lose it completely, maybe Debbie is right and we can't go 122 nights.
We get a Cheesburger in Paradise T-shirt for me at LeSelect. I don't know it, but Debbie insists it is a famous Buffett song, OK. We get on a tender back around 4PM. We get on and then we sit in the harbor and bob for 20 minutes, oh no. Debbie asks the driver what is up and he says that another ship has left and Diamond is repositioning closer to Gustavia and he can't pull up to the ship while this is happening and so we have to wait here since the swells are bigger outside the harbor. Yeah, or we could have happily waited on land. Another 10 minutes or so and we are back on board Diamond. The new location seems calmer. We also notice coming back that while we had assumed the Diamond was anchored, we do not see an anchor chain running down either time we are in the tender. We do see that Diamond is constantly running engines and manuevering to stay more or less in place.
I go in for a nap and Debbie tries lying down and feels worse. She goes back to the jigsaw puzzle just out in the atrium. She says she feels better because it is an interior space and she can't see. While we worked together on the puzzle for a short time before I go full-bore for the nap, an officer came down the stairs and walked by and censured us twice for wasting a beautiful day outside. OK, tsk all you want, but different strokes for different folks, buddy. Debbie convinces me to go with her to tea at 4:30pm, it takes a lot of arm twisting since they have cake. While we are in the Windows Lounge for the tea, a man puts up a sign outside the side room on the lower lever below our table, designating the space for the invitation only, AMEX cardmembers cocktail party this evening. We paid for this cruise on AMEX and we gave Reception a Platinum AMEX imprint for charging our onboard account. We assume this means that we will be invited, and we go back to the room and look for an invitation, but we did not receive one.
Debbie comes in and wakes me for dinner. She stayed at the puzzle for longer than she had planned because another obsessive/compulsive had joined her and he kept telling her, we can't leave until we complete this part. She assured him that the puzzle would still be incomplete when we left the ship and he told her he didn't want to think that. She stayed at it with him, but the flag section of the puzzle remained incomplete, though he made a lot of progress on it. Sunset cocktails and canapes were served by the pool at 6PM but I slept through sunset with the curtains open and Debbie was in the interior without her watch and did not realize the time. We changed and went to dinner at 7:30pm. We hoped to be back in time to watch a movie on TV.
Today is Thurs. 2/3/05.
Debbie slept in and took her time getting her sea legs this morning. I feel bad that the seas did not calm as the Filipinos had told her to expect. She tells me that they did! She says that between 11:30 and midnight it got calm, but by 3AM it got rough again. Oh, well. We walked up to the bridge as we were nearing Gustavia, that is a nice touch, keeping the doors open. I did not realize that we could come & go there until Debbie assured me that Diamond was known for this. I did not hear the anchor go down, but we appear to be drifting around it a mile or 2 from Gustavia. According to my reading of the map and the landmarks I can see, we are anchored between Gustavia and Colombier. I can see the end of the island sometimes and all the rocks with breakers which is labeled Petit Jean. Debbie says she thinks the crescent shaped beach in front of us is Corossol. We would need binoculars to actually see Gustavia from here. Not looking forward to that tender ride, but it is not too good out here either so I think we will go ashore. We timed the first 2 tenders and they took about 10 minutes to load and then 12-15 minutes until they were out of sight in the moored sailboats off Gustavia's harbor.
We had breakfast in The Grand Dining Room but I forgot my camera. I had lamb chops and fried eggs. Ngaire is right RSSC has delicious baby lamb chops and I am not even a big fan of lamb and never had it for breakfast before, but I could get used to it. Debbie had french toast. She did not get enough syrup and thought they should leave the little pitcher at the table for her to serve herself as needed. Good idea. We took things slow, wandered around the ship some more, worked on the jigsaw puzzle in the atrium outside our cabin and then went to lunch. We had lunch at The Grill. I went out to the barbecue on deck and had mixed meat and vegetables with a salad. Debbie stayed with the indoor buffet selections and had a cup of creamy herb soup with some crackers and then tried the pasta station. The cook there fixed her penne Alfredo and then convinced her that it would go very well with the roast pork loin at the adjacent carving station, so between the 2 she got a full plate and ate it all. They were pouring white wine at the deck barbecue but we opted for diet coke and coke instead. Something fizzy felt good on the stomach about now. We heard the PA announcement the the catamaran tour has been canceled. Rough seas?
Debbie has read that things close in Gustavia between noon and 2PM. Since we did not start tendering until after 11AM we are killing time to tender closer to 2PM. We plan to walk around the harbor area at a leisurely pace and then visit the Musee de Saint-Barth. We arrive at the Musee about 5 minutes early, we sit outside through one of the intermittent rain showers for about15 minutes. Debbie gets up to read the sign. It is in French, it has been awhile but she translates it, Closed all afternoon on Weds. only. Closed noon to 2 every other day. We give up and go get me an ice cream cone. After we get to the other side of the harbor again, Debbie sees that the museum doors are open and much, much later we laugh ourselves silly when we realize that Debbie does know the days of the week in French as she recited from memory to me what was on the sign, but that we did not know what day of the week it was. Today is not Weds., it is Thurs.! How goofy are we? A few days on vacation and we lose it completely, maybe Debbie is right and we can't go 122 nights.
We get a Cheesburger in Paradise T-shirt for me at LeSelect. I don't know it, but Debbie insists it is a famous Buffett song, OK. We get on a tender back around 4PM. We get on and then we sit in the harbor and bob for 20 minutes, oh no. Debbie asks the driver what is up and he says that another ship has left and Diamond is repositioning closer to Gustavia and he can't pull up to the ship while this is happening and so we have to wait here since the swells are bigger outside the harbor. Yeah, or we could have happily waited on land. Another 10 minutes or so and we are back on board Diamond. The new location seems calmer. We also notice coming back that while we had assumed the Diamond was anchored, we do not see an anchor chain running down either time we are in the tender. We do see that Diamond is constantly running engines and manuevering to stay more or less in place.
I go in for a nap and Debbie tries lying down and feels worse. She goes back to the jigsaw puzzle just out in the atrium. She says she feels better because it is an interior space and she can't see. While we worked together on the puzzle for a short time before I go full-bore for the nap, an officer came down the stairs and walked by and censured us twice for wasting a beautiful day outside. OK, tsk all you want, but different strokes for different folks, buddy. Debbie convinces me to go with her to tea at 4:30pm, it takes a lot of arm twisting since they have cake. While we are in the Windows Lounge for the tea, a man puts up a sign outside the side room on the lower lever below our table, designating the space for the invitation only, AMEX cardmembers cocktail party this evening. We paid for this cruise on AMEX and we gave Reception a Platinum AMEX imprint for charging our onboard account. We assume this means that we will be invited, and we go back to the room and look for an invitation, but we did not receive one.
Debbie comes in and wakes me for dinner. She stayed at the puzzle for longer than she had planned because another obsessive/compulsive had joined her and he kept telling her, we can't leave until we complete this part. She assured him that the puzzle would still be incomplete when we left the ship and he told her he didn't want to think that. She stayed at it with him, but the flag section of the puzzle remained incomplete, though he made a lot of progress on it. Sunset cocktails and canapes were served by the pool at 6PM but I slept through sunset with the curtains open and Debbie was in the interior without her watch and did not realize the time. We changed and went to dinner at 7:30pm. We hoped to be back in time to watch a movie on TV.
First Night Onboard
First Night Photos
Today is still Weds., 2/2/2005.
So, it is 7:30pm and it is clear that if Debbie doesn't eat soon, she won't make it. She begged to order room service but after checking several times through the afternoon and early evening, the Grand Dining Room menu has still not been put on display and I don't want to call and ask someone over the phone to read the whole thing to me. She will have to go to the restaurant. We make it in and it is really moving. The staff are even staggering to walk. The waiter is sympathetic to Debbie and all the serving Filipinos in the small side room where we are seated come by and reassure her that it is always rough exiting and entering San Juan, but that in 3 1/2 to 4 hours it will calm down. From their lips to God's ears. She has soup, bread and some wine. They tell her the wine is good for her. I don't remember what the wine was, but we both liked it and it was served cold enough for her, which is unusual. She sits and nibbles another piece of bread through my salad and then our first course is delivered. I get ready to photograph it and realize that while Debbie has a filet mignon that I have been served fish and I ordered duckling. While I ponder whether to photograph or not and eat fish or not, Debbie has cut open the filet and it is bleeding on the plate. Not good. She only eats meat cooked very well-done and this would send her out of a room without being green and sweaty from seasickness. She bolts. I realize that we have been served the main courses of the table next to us as do they and now all three of us wait some more for new dishes to be cooked. I skipped dessert to go see about Debbie and either the ship is really moving roughly now or I have drunk way more than I thought I did.
It is bad. Debbie is in bed with the bathroom trashcan next to her. She is moaning and weeping and crying that she has made a terrible mistake. Don't I know it. She says she doesn't know what she was thinking, she can't sail for 122 nights. She is sobbing. I tell her we don't have to go, we can get back the huge sum of money we have already laid out, with the exception of this now very expensive and unnecessary little mini-jaunt.
That is not all. Debbie had reorganized the bathroom. She had moved the toiletries to the bathtub and used the space formed for our things. While we were out, Alina our stewardess, took all of our personal stuff, toothbrushes, etc. off the glass shelves in the bathroom and restacked her extra kleenex and toilet paper and moved all of our person hygiene objects down there. This meant 2 things that really upset Debbie, first that a stranger had touched her toothbrush and second that she had to get under the sink to get it after she had retched her guts empty. She is out-of-control unhappy and I have never seen her this seasick. Ever. She says that Alina walked in on her as she was trying to get undressed and before she had reached the toilet and they bounced off the walls in the little hall between the closets and the bathroom as Alina told her to call room service for crackers and juice if she hadn't eaten. Debbie told me she politely clawed past her newsletter to get to the toilet and Alina left. She told me to put out the privacy sign because Alina had seemed upset to find her in the room. Debbie felt like after the sacrilege she had committed in the bathroom staking out whose territory is whose with those glass shelves that she should have been ashamed to show her face to us again. But, I did not put out the privacy sign. I did call for crackers and juice. I stripped, turned out the lights and got in bed. About 10 minutes later, Alina came in again, with our liquor. It was not pretty. She was very annoyed at me for not putting that sign out. She put up one of her own after that. OK, I messed up, but she did know that the room was occupied and that Debbie was in here being sick. She couldn't hold that liquor delivery 'til morning? Now, Debbie is a little OC, and she is frantic with seasickness, but you know I do see her point about those shelves. We paid about $387/pp/per night to be here and that should have made the entire room ours for the duration. Also, good point about the toothbrushes, I didn't want to think about that while I was brushing, but...Ya know, what in the heck. We have a rough night and a long one. This cruise sails to the furthest point, which is St. Barts at 11AM tomorrow and then makes short jogs back each evening to return to San Juan. It is still rough very early the next morning and I can see small islands in the distance all around us. I will let Debbie stay in bed as long as she wants. I planned to walk a few miles around the track but black smoke is just billowing down over one segment and I don't want to walk that badly. I give it up, sneak back in the room and sit out on the balcony, looking at rainbows.
Today is still Weds., 2/2/2005.
So, it is 7:30pm and it is clear that if Debbie doesn't eat soon, she won't make it. She begged to order room service but after checking several times through the afternoon and early evening, the Grand Dining Room menu has still not been put on display and I don't want to call and ask someone over the phone to read the whole thing to me. She will have to go to the restaurant. We make it in and it is really moving. The staff are even staggering to walk. The waiter is sympathetic to Debbie and all the serving Filipinos in the small side room where we are seated come by and reassure her that it is always rough exiting and entering San Juan, but that in 3 1/2 to 4 hours it will calm down. From their lips to God's ears. She has soup, bread and some wine. They tell her the wine is good for her. I don't remember what the wine was, but we both liked it and it was served cold enough for her, which is unusual. She sits and nibbles another piece of bread through my salad and then our first course is delivered. I get ready to photograph it and realize that while Debbie has a filet mignon that I have been served fish and I ordered duckling. While I ponder whether to photograph or not and eat fish or not, Debbie has cut open the filet and it is bleeding on the plate. Not good. She only eats meat cooked very well-done and this would send her out of a room without being green and sweaty from seasickness. She bolts. I realize that we have been served the main courses of the table next to us as do they and now all three of us wait some more for new dishes to be cooked. I skipped dessert to go see about Debbie and either the ship is really moving roughly now or I have drunk way more than I thought I did.
It is bad. Debbie is in bed with the bathroom trashcan next to her. She is moaning and weeping and crying that she has made a terrible mistake. Don't I know it. She says she doesn't know what she was thinking, she can't sail for 122 nights. She is sobbing. I tell her we don't have to go, we can get back the huge sum of money we have already laid out, with the exception of this now very expensive and unnecessary little mini-jaunt.
That is not all. Debbie had reorganized the bathroom. She had moved the toiletries to the bathtub and used the space formed for our things. While we were out, Alina our stewardess, took all of our personal stuff, toothbrushes, etc. off the glass shelves in the bathroom and restacked her extra kleenex and toilet paper and moved all of our person hygiene objects down there. This meant 2 things that really upset Debbie, first that a stranger had touched her toothbrush and second that she had to get under the sink to get it after she had retched her guts empty. She is out-of-control unhappy and I have never seen her this seasick. Ever. She says that Alina walked in on her as she was trying to get undressed and before she had reached the toilet and they bounced off the walls in the little hall between the closets and the bathroom as Alina told her to call room service for crackers and juice if she hadn't eaten. Debbie told me she politely clawed past her newsletter to get to the toilet and Alina left. She told me to put out the privacy sign because Alina had seemed upset to find her in the room. Debbie felt like after the sacrilege she had committed in the bathroom staking out whose territory is whose with those glass shelves that she should have been ashamed to show her face to us again. But, I did not put out the privacy sign. I did call for crackers and juice. I stripped, turned out the lights and got in bed. About 10 minutes later, Alina came in again, with our liquor. It was not pretty. She was very annoyed at me for not putting that sign out. She put up one of her own after that. OK, I messed up, but she did know that the room was occupied and that Debbie was in here being sick. She couldn't hold that liquor delivery 'til morning? Now, Debbie is a little OC, and she is frantic with seasickness, but you know I do see her point about those shelves. We paid about $387/pp/per night to be here and that should have made the entire room ours for the duration. Also, good point about the toothbrushes, I didn't want to think about that while I was brushing, but...Ya know, what in the heck. We have a rough night and a long one. This cruise sails to the furthest point, which is St. Barts at 11AM tomorrow and then makes short jogs back each evening to return to San Juan. It is still rough very early the next morning and I can see small islands in the distance all around us. I will let Debbie stay in bed as long as she wants. I planned to walk a few miles around the track but black smoke is just billowing down over one segment and I don't want to walk that badly. I give it up, sneak back in the room and sit out on the balcony, looking at rainbows.
Boarding Diamond
Weds., 2/2/2005
Afternoon traffic was a nightmare, plus the bridge to Condado is under renovation, so even worse than normal probably. It takes us about an hour to go get the bags and return to the pier.
Embarkation is a breeze. We literally just walk right on. We checked our bags with them, exchanged our passports and cruise ticket for a little vinyl wallet with our boarding card and cabin keycard. The guy who took our bags walked us over to security screening where they x-rayed the rest of what we were carrying and through a metal detector. Then up the gangway. I felt like I was being deloused at the top of the gangway at the hand sanitizer. But, Debbie told me not to take it personally and that it was to keep away Norwalk virus and standard procedure. OK. Anyway, before my hands had dried at the top of the stairs we were greated with the offer of champagne and a security photo then, an escort to our cabin. Lovely. The ship is really beautiful inside even if it appears a little odd from the outside. We wait for one of the glass elevators and then go up only 1 floor and our cabin is just off the atrium. Very convenient. It is a very attractive cabin, if small, but the trade off is the very private balcony and I will spend many hours here enjoying the views. Excellent.
I took pictures while Debbie got us unpacked, the bags stowed under the bed and the bed mat put away. It is a tight space but has lots of drawers and she gets our little bit of stuff put away without trouble. It is only a 4-night cruise so we have packed exceedingly lightly. This would not be a fantastic cabin for a long cruise though. Debbie usually brings her own toiletries but since this is a short trip and she has read rave reviews of RSSC's toiletries she left her own at home. Unfortunately, the "refreshing body wash" is made with aloe. She is allergic and does not read the bottle until after she feels it burning. She rinsed off quickly, got out of the shower for her glasses and read all the labels carefully now. Strangely, the body wash is the only product with aloe, usually you find it in lotion. She had brought several Olay daily facial clothes, so she uses those to bathe now and hereafter, but the hives do not abate for 24 hours.
After we have showered, we change to our after 6PM clothes and take a tour of the ship. We had to go to the reception desk to get a deck plan. But, the receptionist there was very courteous and highlighted the main things, like our cabin and the restaurants for us. I asked him how many people were aboard and he did not know for sure. I asked him how many laps around the track for a mile and he said good question, he did not know. OK. After our tour, we came back and told him 13 laps and he told us just over 200 people between 200 and 300 and that we were nowhere near capacity of 350. OK.
I was extremely disappointed to find no treadmill in the fitness center. I admit I am an addict and now I have no laptop and no treadmill. I am denied my 2 extreme vices on vacation!!
We went back to our balcony to have a private sailaway. Good thing! Rough water. Debbie has been taking meclizine continuously since before she left home and now she is also cranking up the voltage on her Relief Band. But this ship has a weird motion. I think that the twin-hull design that has it sitting on such a wide stance so high above the surface of the water may make it worse riding in big swells like this than an ordinary ship with stabilizers below the water's surface. It is a disturbing motion, not a regular rocking and rolling ship motion and I don't get sick but I don't like it.
Debbie is green and sweaty. Rut-roh.
Lunch time and finding Diamond
Photos
Weds., 2/2/2005
We had spotted Diamond from San Cristobal and after further walking and map checking followed by actually arriving at the piers we found that Diamond was really at Pier 4. It was being dwarfed by a Celebrity ship. We walked from El Morro through small hilly streets to Ben & Jerry's (Calle del Cristo 61) and bought some very cool t-shirts. (Discovered after we got home that the cashier had put an XL and an XXL in the bag, oops, no shirt for Debbie and I get 2. Didn't really want 2 because though they had a cool graphic on the back they were 50/50 material, yuck.) Turned the corner at Ben & Jerry's and headed down Sol for Tanca where Debbie's next restaurant should be. It is El Jibarito (Calle Sol 280) and specializes in criollo, which is said to be a blend of the island's African, Spanish and Taino Indian heritage that is flavorful and inexpensive. Just what I am after. We found the place easily on Sol near Tanca and it is charming indoors and air conditioned, ah. It is busy with mostly local business people having lunch with a few obvious tourists in the mix, including us, very obvious tourists. I get the cabrito stew (goat) and Debbie gets the pork tamale or its equivalent. We follow the waiter's recommendation and she gets the fried green plantains and I get the sweet fried plantains, she gets the yellow rice with pink beans and I get the white rice with red beans. The red beans come in a separate bowl and I pour mine over the white rice because it seems right. Later I see a local guy in a tie do the same thing, so it is right. Debbie orders ice water and I order a Medalla, a local beer and it is served ice cold, perfect. Debbie puts our mascot, Little Bob the stuffed airedale terrier, on the table by the beer and I photograph the table. Debbie smiles and waves to someone and then I hear a man behind me ask her how many places in the world that airedale has been before today, she tells him around the world once and he offers to take our picture. How very nice. Everything is delicious, I get cabrito on my shorts and the bill is under $20, all is right with the world.
We leave rejuvenated. (Debbie made me take an Aleve. I hope it doesn't kill me later. You know my knee wasn't really that bad until the flights, I think the pressurized cabins and sitting still in cramped quarters made it really balloon up.) We take a meandering walk to look around on our way down to verify the Diamond's location for the taxi ride later. We stop at Maria's for cold drinks. (Calle del Cristo 204) Frommer's awards them best drinks. I have a lime freeze and though Debbie orders a chocolate frost, she gets a banana frost. Both are good and cold and hit the spot. We take them to go and keep wandering, we follow the old city walls down to the docks. We reconnoiter the dock area and then approach a cabbie about a ride to Condado to Holiday Inn Express and back to Diamond with 2 bags. We did not even get to ride the trolleys around Old San Juan like we had planned, but I am ready to quit and we have had a good day. Diamond, here we come.
Weds., 2/2/2005
We had spotted Diamond from San Cristobal and after further walking and map checking followed by actually arriving at the piers we found that Diamond was really at Pier 4. It was being dwarfed by a Celebrity ship. We walked from El Morro through small hilly streets to Ben & Jerry's (Calle del Cristo 61) and bought some very cool t-shirts. (Discovered after we got home that the cashier had put an XL and an XXL in the bag, oops, no shirt for Debbie and I get 2. Didn't really want 2 because though they had a cool graphic on the back they were 50/50 material, yuck.) Turned the corner at Ben & Jerry's and headed down Sol for Tanca where Debbie's next restaurant should be. It is El Jibarito (Calle Sol 280) and specializes in criollo, which is said to be a blend of the island's African, Spanish and Taino Indian heritage that is flavorful and inexpensive. Just what I am after. We found the place easily on Sol near Tanca and it is charming indoors and air conditioned, ah. It is busy with mostly local business people having lunch with a few obvious tourists in the mix, including us, very obvious tourists. I get the cabrito stew (goat) and Debbie gets the pork tamale or its equivalent. We follow the waiter's recommendation and she gets the fried green plantains and I get the sweet fried plantains, she gets the yellow rice with pink beans and I get the white rice with red beans. The red beans come in a separate bowl and I pour mine over the white rice because it seems right. Later I see a local guy in a tie do the same thing, so it is right. Debbie orders ice water and I order a Medalla, a local beer and it is served ice cold, perfect. Debbie puts our mascot, Little Bob the stuffed airedale terrier, on the table by the beer and I photograph the table. Debbie smiles and waves to someone and then I hear a man behind me ask her how many places in the world that airedale has been before today, she tells him around the world once and he offers to take our picture. How very nice. Everything is delicious, I get cabrito on my shorts and the bill is under $20, all is right with the world.
We leave rejuvenated. (Debbie made me take an Aleve. I hope it doesn't kill me later. You know my knee wasn't really that bad until the flights, I think the pressurized cabins and sitting still in cramped quarters made it really balloon up.) We take a meandering walk to look around on our way down to verify the Diamond's location for the taxi ride later. We stop at Maria's for cold drinks. (Calle del Cristo 204) Frommer's awards them best drinks. I have a lime freeze and though Debbie orders a chocolate frost, she gets a banana frost. Both are good and cold and hit the spot. We take them to go and keep wandering, we follow the old city walls down to the docks. We reconnoiter the dock area and then approach a cabbie about a ride to Condado to Holiday Inn Express and back to Diamond with 2 bags. We did not even get to ride the trolleys around Old San Juan like we had planned, but I am ready to quit and we have had a good day. Diamond, here we come.
Castillo de San Felipe del Morro
El Morro Photos
Weds., 2/2/2005
Here are photos of El Morro, we did not find a friendly, helpful ranger. It was hot, sunny, relatively crowded, past lunchtime, and my knee was tiring. We enjoyed it and probably could have spent more time there but will save it for a more thorough look at another time. We probably gave it an average overview and were impressed but we really liked San Cristobal better. I think it was in better shape overall. But, everything in this city seems to be undergoing restoration, which is an excellent thing.
Weds., 2/2/2005
Here are photos of El Morro, we did not find a friendly, helpful ranger. It was hot, sunny, relatively crowded, past lunchtime, and my knee was tiring. We enjoyed it and probably could have spent more time there but will save it for a more thorough look at another time. We probably gave it an average overview and were impressed but we really liked San Cristobal better. I think it was in better shape overall. But, everything in this city seems to be undergoing restoration, which is an excellent thing.
San Cristobal
San Cristobal Photos
Weds., 2/2/2005
After Jorge turned us loose we explored the other levels of the Fort San Cristobal. It was a lot of steep ramps, and tiny circular stairs but I did it. It is an amazing place. We could not actually see what was in the dungeon until I downloaded these pictures. It was really dark in there with one dim uplight at the door and one tiny slit window at the far end. I don't know how far down it was but it seemed like we went down in the tunnel for a few minutes before reaching the dungeon, you had to really know where it was and be looking for it. Anyway, we went in and there was just enough light at the top of the narrow downsloping dungeon tunnel to see the pictures hand drawn on the wall of old Spanish sailing ships under plexiglas (so they did not photograph well) and then further down a rope across and darkness. Debbie told me she thought something was down there and to snap a photo with flash. We couldn't see anything at the time, but temporarily blinded ourselves, had a good laugh and then a better laugh when we got home and downloaded the photos to computer, it is number six here. (Since we were traveling to and from the Diamond independently and leaving our luggage in a couple of places before and after the cruise, I left my laptop at home. I really missed it! Our cruise documents stated that we would have no formal evenings, but since that really only excluded packing a tie for me, and we were trying to stay at one carry-on each I felt that I really couldn't bring the laptop. After we boarded the ship, the first Passages on the bed when we entered the room stated the dress for all 4 nights and it was ALL CASUAL. AARGH! I could have brought my laptop instead of those clothes!!)
Next we walked over to El Morro, just about a mile apart.
Weds., 2/2/2005
After Jorge turned us loose we explored the other levels of the Fort San Cristobal. It was a lot of steep ramps, and tiny circular stairs but I did it. It is an amazing place. We could not actually see what was in the dungeon until I downloaded these pictures. It was really dark in there with one dim uplight at the door and one tiny slit window at the far end. I don't know how far down it was but it seemed like we went down in the tunnel for a few minutes before reaching the dungeon, you had to really know where it was and be looking for it. Anyway, we went in and there was just enough light at the top of the narrow downsloping dungeon tunnel to see the pictures hand drawn on the wall of old Spanish sailing ships under plexiglas (so they did not photograph well) and then further down a rope across and darkness. Debbie told me she thought something was down there and to snap a photo with flash. We couldn't see anything at the time, but temporarily blinded ourselves, had a good laugh and then a better laugh when we got home and downloaded the photos to computer, it is number six here. (Since we were traveling to and from the Diamond independently and leaving our luggage in a couple of places before and after the cruise, I left my laptop at home. I really missed it! Our cruise documents stated that we would have no formal evenings, but since that really only excluded packing a tie for me, and we were trying to stay at one carry-on each I felt that I really couldn't bring the laptop. After we boarded the ship, the first Passages on the bed when we entered the room stated the dress for all 4 nights and it was ALL CASUAL. AARGH! I could have brought my laptop instead of those clothes!!)
Next we walked over to El Morro, just about a mile apart.
The Forts of Old San Juan
San Cristobal Photos
Weds., 2/2/05
We start at the highest point with the plan of working our way down and around to the docks and Diamond. Our documents state it will be at Pier 1 West, Embark Time 3PM. We have to walk uphill about 2-3 blocks to enter San Cristobal, but I want to take a more scenic walk, so against Debbie's advice I take us on about a 12 block detour, but we got to see the roof dogs overseeing the comings and goings on Calle Norzagaray. We wouldn't have wanted to miss that! Then we walk back down to near where she started us, in order the climb the short steep hill to enter the fort. (I am glad she insisted on the Ace Bandage!) It is breezy and warm and not too cloudy, so I am glad that Debbie insisted on slathering our exposed parts with sunscreen and carrying our sunhats.
We pay to enter both forts and this receipt is good for 7 days in case we decide to come back at the end of the cruise we can. We love history and architecture. Debbie asked the girl who took our admission if they ever have guided tours, she replied no, but that she would call the ranger on duty and ask if he would speak to us. He directs us up to his location. We met Jorge Davila and he went out of his way to bring the fort to life for us. He was thoughtful and generous in spirit as he shared his time and wealth of knowledge with us. He walked us around and unlocked the dormitory for our "photo op." There were a lot of people there with models and cameras, according to Jorge, working on an article for a "boat magazine." So, he thought we should not be left out and posed us for picture 4 inside the dormitory which he told us is off limits to visitors and "no touching." I guess he was so pleased to be asked to share that he just couldn't do enough special for us. We really appreciated his going above and beyond and sent e-letters commending him up the NPS and DOI chain of command. He really brought Old San Juan to life for us and made it an extra special day for us. If you are ever there, ask for him! (PS: Debbie's same tactic at El Morro did not have anywhere near the same success. We did speak to a ranger, who only went over the brochure/map with us and sent us on our way. Oh, well. We will attribute it to the fact that it was busier at El Morro later in the day than it was at San Cristobal in the morning.)
Weds., 2/2/05
We start at the highest point with the plan of working our way down and around to the docks and Diamond. Our documents state it will be at Pier 1 West, Embark Time 3PM. We have to walk uphill about 2-3 blocks to enter San Cristobal, but I want to take a more scenic walk, so against Debbie's advice I take us on about a 12 block detour, but we got to see the roof dogs overseeing the comings and goings on Calle Norzagaray. We wouldn't have wanted to miss that! Then we walk back down to near where she started us, in order the climb the short steep hill to enter the fort. (I am glad she insisted on the Ace Bandage!) It is breezy and warm and not too cloudy, so I am glad that Debbie insisted on slathering our exposed parts with sunscreen and carrying our sunhats.
We pay to enter both forts and this receipt is good for 7 days in case we decide to come back at the end of the cruise we can. We love history and architecture. Debbie asked the girl who took our admission if they ever have guided tours, she replied no, but that she would call the ranger on duty and ask if he would speak to us. He directs us up to his location. We met Jorge Davila and he went out of his way to bring the fort to life for us. He was thoughtful and generous in spirit as he shared his time and wealth of knowledge with us. He walked us around and unlocked the dormitory for our "photo op." There were a lot of people there with models and cameras, according to Jorge, working on an article for a "boat magazine." So, he thought we should not be left out and posed us for picture 4 inside the dormitory which he told us is off limits to visitors and "no touching." I guess he was so pleased to be asked to share that he just couldn't do enough special for us. We really appreciated his going above and beyond and sent e-letters commending him up the NPS and DOI chain of command. He really brought Old San Juan to life for us and made it an extra special day for us. If you are ever there, ask for him! (PS: Debbie's same tactic at El Morro did not have anywhere near the same success. We did speak to a ranger, who only went over the brochure/map with us and sent us on our way. Oh, well. We will attribute it to the fact that it was busier at El Morro later in the day than it was at San Cristobal in the morning.)
A Good Start
Mallorcas!
Today is 2/2/05
We left the bags with the Front Desk at the Holiday Inn Express Condado with plans to come back for them after 2pm when we were done sightseeing and ready to board Diamond. We were checked out and in a taxi to Old San Juan before 9AM. Debbie had picked out some places from guidebooks for us to eat. I love to eat foods that are special to a particular place, it is one of my favorite things. So, Debbie gives the driver the address 300 Calle San Francisco, Cafeteria Mallorca. He knows it, gives her a strange look and confirms that is where we want to go, she shows him her highlighted, photocopied Fodor's page and off we go. We are going to have the specialty here, the mallorca. We order ours with ham & cheese. Interesting. It is a sweet pastry (or bread, as the waiter calls it) that is sandwiched & grilled panini-style and covered in powdered sugar. Debbie also has the cafe con leche.
Debbie has started us at the top of the hill not far from Fort San Cristobal, so after breakfast that is where we go.
Today is 2/2/05
We left the bags with the Front Desk at the Holiday Inn Express Condado with plans to come back for them after 2pm when we were done sightseeing and ready to board Diamond. We were checked out and in a taxi to Old San Juan before 9AM. Debbie had picked out some places from guidebooks for us to eat. I love to eat foods that are special to a particular place, it is one of my favorite things. So, Debbie gives the driver the address 300 Calle San Francisco, Cafeteria Mallorca. He knows it, gives her a strange look and confirms that is where we want to go, she shows him her highlighted, photocopied Fodor's page and off we go. We are going to have the specialty here, the mallorca. We order ours with ham & cheese. Interesting. It is a sweet pastry (or bread, as the waiter calls it) that is sandwiched & grilled panini-style and covered in powdered sugar. Debbie also has the cafe con leche.
Debbie has started us at the top of the hill not far from Fort San Cristobal, so after breakfast that is where we go.
An Inauspicious Beginning
Today is 2/1/2005.
We booked this trip on 1/3 at the same time we waitlisted for the Voyager World Cruise FLL-FLL. We needed to take this trip to qualify for discounts on a 2nd cruise, the big one. We are also trying to save time off work and money for that trip, so we needed to go ASAP and keep it short & preferably over a weekend. This 4-night Diamond cruise was the best shot at all those objectives.
The bad start begins with me slipping on black ice and falling in the parking lot early in the morning of the day before we are to leave. My thigh is bruised where my keys were in my pocket and my knee begins to swell about 8 hours later, but I don't think I am hurt too badly until much later, too much later to do anything about it; we are going. My office is near the airport, I like to leave the car parked in the lot here and just get a co-worker to drop and pickup from the airport when possible. Since we are leaving midday on 2/1 for San Juan, that leaves Debbie at home in downtown Raleigh. She offered to get up with me and drive me to the office at 3AM and then come back when it is time to go to the airport so we would only have one car out here. She called when she got back home to tell me that the closest cross-street to ours had a street closed sign at the intersection. Usually this means a wreck has taken out the nearest electric transformer and our power is out, but she reports that the power is on. Hmmm? Now, you have to know Debbie to know where this is going. Don't clean the house until right before you leave, so if you die no one will see that anyone ever lived there. Don't shower until right before you leave, same reasoning, a step beyond the wear clean underwear maxim that I know you are familiar with... Debbie calls hours later after she has slept until after sunrise (which is in her world the only reasonable time to awake) and is distraught. There is NO WATER. She has called the utilities dept. and been told that ours is the 3rd water main break in the city overnight and that the crew is working on them in order and ours is last. (She was to leave the house at noon to pick me up and get us to the airport 2 hours early.) At 10AM, she calls them again and they tell her they are working on it but they don't expect to have the water back on at our house before 3PM. She bathes with premoistened towellettes and brushes her teeth with some bottled water and smoothes down her bedhead with another bottle and vacates the filthy house a little after 11AM before her head explodes.
So, we get to the airport very early, clear security without problems or delay and enjoy a leisurely Mexican food lunch. We stroll around Terminal C which we have not been inside in years and then sit for about an hour to wait to board. Everyone else was early too and with everyone boarded we left the gate almost 10 minutes early. (We used AA miles that I had accumulated years ago and forgotten about. It took 60,000 miles for the 2 of us RT economy class to SJU. I don't know if that was the best use of the miles but I didn't even remember that I had them until Debbie went online to AA and went through the clicks to redeem them. The flight options that we got were no worse than what Expedia, Travelocity, Orbitz, etc. were offering and it would mean not spending money, only miles I had forgotten about, so that brings us to the AA gate.) We flew first to Miami, where we had a 2.5 hour layover. We located our gate, then looked for a place for dinner and chose Island Grill. I ordered a burger and Debbie, a pulled Jerk Chicken Sandwich. The first mustard packet I picked up did not want to open and rather than put it down and pick up another, I manhandled it and it exploded all over the left side of my chest. Who knew there was that much mustard in a little packet, it never seems like that much when you squeeze it onto the burger! Debbie watched me shred my napkin in the water glass, then opened her purse and handed me a pre-moistened towellette. I flagged the waiter down for more napkins and when I finished, pushed the pre-moistened towellette back across the table and told her she better hold onto to it, she might need it later. She replied, very funny, you never know. It is so easy to push her buttons, but she's right, you do never know. We are staying the night at the Holiday Inn Express Condado because it is relatively inexpensive. That burger gave me terrible gas, or else it is karmic payback for messing with Debbie over that towellette.
Next flight, is a little rough, but we left and arrived on time and since we are traveling with one carryon each walk right out to the cabs. It is a fairly short ride in no traffic and we are checked in just before midnight. The room is good-sized and clean and has running water and power. Life is good. I especially like the all tile floors. We both take hot showers and sleep like babies.
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