CANADAY TRAVEL BLOG: Caribbean Princess - May 26th

Caribbean Princess

May 26th - June 4th, 2011

Debe and Jennifer

(New York, NY; Bermuda (west end); San Juan, Puerto Rico; St. Thomas; Grand Turk; New York, NY)

After our flights from St. Louis to Chicago to New York, which included a lot of running, we arrived in New York. We were booked on a shuttle to the ship so it was off to the bus and then on to the ship. Very smooth. Once there, we were able to go directly to the cabin. (reminder - small photos can be seen larger by clicking onto them. Remember to click the back arrow when finished otherwise closing it closes the blog)

The skyline in New York is always great to see along with the Statue of Liberty but today, the haze kept us from getting the best view. So, Jennifer and I settled in for a sailaway movie at the Movie Under the Stars. Much to our surprise, sailaway also gave us an up close view of the bridge just above the movie screen as we sailed under it.

Our first stop was Bermuda. This would be my 3rd time there but never with Bob. ;( Our ship docked at Heritage Wharf at the Naval Dockyard. Since we didn't make the cut for the tour, we decided to walk around the Dockyard and over to a beach I had heard about. Snorkel Beach is a small beach with an entrance fee of $5 pp but very nice. They had snorkel rental, jet skis, food, chairs, etc.. all for a fee. We didn't have our swimsuits on so we checked out the beach, then shopped and headed back to the ship.

While in port in Bermuda, the RCCL Explorer of the Seas was sitting next to us. What a great looking ship. In the below photo, you can see her as she sailed around the island of Bermuda just in front of us. Stunning to watch.

The next port of call was San Juan, PR. It was so neat sailing into San Juan during daylight and seeing El Morro Fort, Fort Cristabol, and the Racine Fountain from the ship/water. I have been here many times but never saw this due to most ships coming in while I am asleep and leaving after dark. Here we walked around, shopped at CVS, then headed back to the ship. We had just been here in January so we really didn't have anything we wanted to see/buy or do.

The popular St. Thomas was our next port of call, . We shopped right at the pier which was at Crown Bay Marina. I did try to get the internet in the open area of the shopping for a cost of $4 as long as you wanted but didn't have much luck on my IPAD. Next time I will take my laptop off the ship. We then headed back to the pool on the ship to work on our tan. Again, we were here in January on this same ship and this is a popular stop on all ships.

Our final port of call was Grand Turk. This port of call is not on very many itineraries but is a nice one. It is sort of like a private island with a huge Margaritaville built right on it. You can use the chair/pool at Margaritaville or chose a chair on the beach. There is shopping with local goods and/or other stores here. One thing they offer at Margaritaville is the Flow Rider which I have only seen on bigger RCCL ships. You can boogie board and/or surf. The cost isn't cheap here though. For a cost of $29 per hour for boogie boarding and/or $39.75 for 1 1/2 hours of doing both boogie boarding and surfing. In below photos you can see more information/photos/video about this flowrider.

An interesting thing I found this time was an exhibit for the Mercury Spaceship that splashed down just in the ocean off of Grand Turk. This space ship was piloted by John Glenn who orbited the earth three times before splashing down on Feb 20th, 1962. Everyone was glued to their televisions and radios as this major event in history took place. And to think, it was right off of beautiful Grand Turk.

And of course, my blog wouldn't be complete without a lovely sunset.

I have to admit, this was an unusual cruise for me but very relaxing. In the nine days, only 4 ports of calls and the rest - at sea days. We did not dress up for formal nights, we did not go to shows, we did not eat in the dining room, we just did our own thing. We watched a lot of movies at the Movies Under the Stars and ate, slept, and did what we wanted. So when they say, cruising is what you want it to be - this cruise was relaxing and rejuvenating. Which I needed with my very busy lifestyle. Even though I missed my hubby (who by the way was off fishing in Canada with his uncle (Fred), dad (Gerald) and son (Ryan), it was great to just relax and not worry about anything. (coming soon the Canada fishing trip blog) So thanks again for joining me on this trip, not exotic, not a lot of history, not even a lot of things we did - but very relaxing.