Southern Caribbean Cruise
We went on a Southern Caribbean Cruise in March. This was my first cruise, and will definitely not be my last. I got sea sick, it was worse when I was at the back of the ship, especially in the dining room. But thanks to ginger tea and caramelized ginger, I did not throw up. Also, because we sailed out of San Juan, the sea was a lot calmer; that helped tremendously with my motion sickness too. Plus, we had only 1 sea day at the beginning. We visited a new port every day. Gotta love that!
I was surprised at how big the ship was. And it wasn’t even the biggest cruise ship. Oasis of the Seas would be so much bigger. To minimize motion sickness, I was advised to get an inside cabin, as close to the center of the ship as possible. The cabin was small, but very functional. Every thing was designed with a purpose in mind. The bathroom was adequate for 2 people. I didn’t feel trapped at all.
I was amazed at how efficient the ship crews were. There were 1,600+ staff members to support more than 3,200 guests. The cabins were cleaned twice a day. Each evening, we got a new bucket of ice and entertainment schedule for the next day. On the exchange day (last day/first day of the cruise), the ship had to feed and unloaded 3,200+ people and their luggage by 11:00am. Then cleaned all the rooms, sanitized, made and served lunch, boarded another 3,200+ people, AND delivered their bags to the right rooms by 2:00pm! Every night, the kitchen prepared more than 10,000 meals all together. Yet, our dinners in the main dining room always arrived promptly and hot. Our waiter overheard us talking about one of our favorite food one day. From that day on, every single night without failing, he brought a small plate of that food prepared differently just for us. And he always brought out all the desserts they had to offer on that particular night for us to try. The service was top notch, attentive but not over bearing. The staff worked very hard, but they always greeted us with a smile.
For each meal, we had the choice of room service, 3 restaurants, main dining room and the buffet to choose from. The buffets offered plenty of choices, even the pickiest person could find something to eat here. Besides the stables - pizzas, spaghetti, hamburgers, sandwiches, fries, sushi, rice, salads, soups and fresh fruits - the buffet menus changed every day. Besides room service, there was also a café that offered food, drinks & snacks 24/7. You would never go hungry or run out of things to eat on the cruise.
The food quality, the variety, the service, couldn’t really complain. Oh and the desserts, absolutely amazing! Thuan doesn’t like sweets in general, but he loved desserts on the cruise. We had the best flan and mango mousse on this trip. The food on the cruise was definitely better than all other all-inclusives we’ve been to. And nightly entertainment was definitely better. Although I was told that it wasn’t as good as before, but to first time cruisers like me, it was great. I love cruising. It’s like a mobile all inclusive. You get to visit many destinations, but only have to unpack once. Our next one will be to Europe.
Out of the islands that we’ve been to on this trip, Antigua & St. Maarten/St. Martin were our favorites.
Barbados We took the taxi on our own to downtown, then to Brighton Beach. Unlike advertisement, downtown Barbados was kind of run down, nothing like London. Brighton Beach was un-crowded, beautiful water and sand. We then decided to walk back to our cruise ship, not realized how far it was. It was quite a walk, took us an hr and fifteen minute. Thuan wanted to take the taxi half way through, but I insisted that we walked (so that we could eat more when we got back to the ship!)
St. Lucia We booked Harrod’s private tour “Land & Sea Safari” to twin peaks of the Pitons, Marigot Bay, La Soufriere waterfalls, Botanical Garden, Drive-In Volcano, and Jalousie beach. St. Lucia’s main export is bananas, which are smaller, but sweeter than bananas we can buy from the States. Harrod also got us fresh coconuts along the way. We had a quick refreshing (read COLD!) during our short stop at the waterfalls. I wanted to go to the mud bath, but we didn’t have time for that. The drive-in volcano was interesting; steams of sulfur were of course smelly, but not unbearable. We had a delicious home-cooked meal at Harrod’s parents’ house, completed with fresh squeezed grapefruit juice. The grapefruits were from their garden. I also got to try banana ketchup, which was very interesting. After lunch, we took a speed boat to Jalousie beach, which is nestled between the famous twin peaks. I really looked forward to that, but it turned out to be such a disappointment. The beach and the ocean floor were full of rocks and coral pieces, which was painful to walk on. The white sand here was imported to make the beach more appealing to tourists. We learned that most beaches in St. Lucia have black volcanic sand (including the famous and most expensive Jade Mountain resort beach). The boat then took us back to our ship. We got to see St. Lucia both from land (very windy roads) and sea, at half the cost of RCL.
Antigua Antigua is known for their beautiful beaches. If you go to a beach a day here, it will take you more than a year to visit all the beaches in Antigua. We really loved it here, clear turquoise water, white sand beaches, perfect weather. We did the kayak tour with RCL, using Paddle’s. We paddled in the beautiful mangroves. Then boarded a speed boat to Great Bird Island. The view from the top of Great Bird Island was amazing. We did some snorkeling, but didn’t see much fish. Before we left Paddles, the host served us home-made punch and delicious banana bread, which was her mother-in-law’s recipe.
St. Maarten/St. Martin Per local tourism center, we went to a beach near Orient Beach (I forgot the name). There were definitely lots of locals there. But it was not any where near beautiful as Orient Beach. The water was calm, clear, but not blue. Also, there were lots of twigs and other debris in the sand. So we went back to Orient Beach for the rest of the day.
Orient Beach has a nude section. We saw WAY more than we liked to…but the beach was beautiful with fine white sand and crystal blue water. You can easily get a taxi from the port to this beach. All fares are regulated and posted. However, if you share the taxi with others, you can cut the costs dramatically.
Beautiful sunshine. White sand. Crystal clear, turquoise warm water. What more can you ask for?
St. Croix Again, we made the mistake of listening to locals…The beach that came highly recommended by them was such a disappointment. So we asked the taxi driver if she could take us to Carambola Beach (at Rockefeller Resort) instead. And she did, for no extra charge. Carambola Beach & the resort itself were beautiful. The waves were rougher than other places we’d been to on this trip, but nothing compared to Virginia Beach! I had the best virgin mango colada here. Again, by doing this on our own, we saved more than $100. RCL has the same tour for $89pp, bringing people to this exact resort.