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Live-ish + RECAP. Thanksgiving Adventure on Adventure OTS, 23 Nov to 1 Dec 2019


FionaMG

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Well the internet seems to be working much better now. Looks like they may actually have managed to fix it. Fingers crossed.

Dinner tonight was very nice. The menu was presented like a rolled-up scroll, tied with a yellow ribbon. The wait staff were collecting them after taking the orders but I asked if I could keep it. ?

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I started with the sweet potato and butternut squash soup, which was very good.

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The beef wellington was excellent, very tender and tasty. Luckily we ordered it done medium rare; I think if we had asked for medium well it would probably have been too dry.

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And for dessert, since I couldn't decide between the pumpkin pie and the pecan tart, I just asked for both! ? They were very good. It was just a pity I was too full to finish them!

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20 hours ago, FionaMG said:

It's a great itinerary and has been an excellent cruise. ?

Just two sea days left now till they make us get off.

I don't have to go right back to work when we get home, so I will have time to do the recap next week. If you have any particular questions, feel free to ask.

Thank you.  ? 

I am looking forward to having two sea days back to back.  

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3 hours ago, teddy said:

Thank you.  ? 

I am looking forward to having two sea days back to back.  

I know the feeling. I especially like having them at the end of the cruise as it gives you time to relax and recover from the port days before having to get round to the dreaded packing.

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Tonight was lobster night.

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We took our assistant waiter up on his suggestion to make it into a surf and turf dish.

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I had the "molten" chocolate cake which was disappointingly unmolten.

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And Fernando had the baked alaska which was fine.

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We saw some of the 50th birthday cakes being distributed to nearby tables but for some reason none of them made it to ours. Not that I had room for it anyway.

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Today is our last day on board and the ship has been rocking quite a lot since we left St. Martin. We went to the Captain's question time this morning and he said it is due to a weather system 200 miles to the north.  Somebody else told us there is a massive storm brewing covering a large part of the US so I hope it will not impact anyone who is due to sail this weekend.

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The internet has been much better since we left St. Martin.

They acknowledged the issue and refunded 40% of the package cost to my onboard account.

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I kind of feel it should have been more than that since it wasn't fixed until day 6 but since I was using it for the other days, even if it was not up to par, I guess I won't quibble.

I have saved all of the Compasses and will post the pics when I do the recap, as well as sending them to Matt to post in the Compass section.

I also have most of the MDR menus and will see if I can get the two I am missing later on in the diamond lounge so I can them all too.

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Well, they made us get off the ship yesterday. Boo. ?

From the last wake-up call to putting our key in the front door this morning, we went 24 straight hours, so we are pretty zonked out. 

I will be starting my recap review after I have had some rest, and will post all the stuff I couldn't post while on board.

Thanks again to everyone who tried to follow despite the internet issues. I hope you will stay with me for the recap. ?

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  • FionaMG changed the title to Live-ish + RECAP. Thanksgiving Adventure on Adventure OTS, 23 Nov to 1 Dec 2019

I spent most of the day today uploading my pics from phone and tablet to my computer so I will be able to start posting stuff tomorrow. 

I just read through what I was able to post on board and see I have a couple of posts/pics duplicated, which must have happened when I was impatiently pressing enter and not getting a response while the internet was acting up. I found out from the voom man onboard that the problem was caused by one of their servers malfunctioning.

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Recap starts here, so there will be some backtracking and I will possibly refer to stuff that I was able to post while onboard.

21 November - Arrival in Miami - transfer to Fort Lauderdale - overnight in the Best Western Plus Oceanside Inn on Seabreeze Boulevard.

Our flight arrived on time in Miami. This was something of an achievement given not only that TAP have a less than stellar punctuality record but also that the flight actually took off 30 minutes late.

About four or five other international flights had landed around the same time so the line for immigration was long. We were still a way away from the front when they started redirecting little batches of about five or six people to the agents who had been processing US citizens and were now more or less twiddling their thumbs. We were lucky to be included in one of the batches and even luckier to get the only bright and cheerful agent (the others all seemed very grim) who glanced at our passports, asked us if we were going on a cruise and waved us through. Yay! :14_relaxed:

By this time the bags were all out on the carousel so we collected ours and headed out towards the doors. We had decided ahead of time to try and use either Lyft or Uber, assuming I would be able to connect to the airport WiFi, failing which we would just go to the Super Shuttle desk, since both of these options would be a lot cheaper than a taxi or a limo service. Luckily, after a few minutes trying to work out how to connect I was able to do so and we ordered a Lyft, which took a few minutes to come because although I had indicated that we were downstairs on the arrivals level the driver was looking for us upstairs. Anyway it worked and the total cost came in at just under $40 including tip. Score!

We had a room booked for our two pre-cruise nights at the Best Western on Seabreeze, which we stayed at on our last visit to Fort Lauderdale. Our room was a standard room with two queen beds and a balcony. Since it was booked well in advance it came in at under $300 for the two nights. When I checked the pricing just a week before we travelled, it was up to $500!

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The rate at the BW includes breakfast and it is a pretty decent one too, with hot items, various breads and cold cuts, fresh fruit, make your own waffles, cereals and a fresh yogurt dispenser. I particularly liked the yogurt, very creamy and delicious. I didn't take pics of the hot items but they included things like scrambled eggs, Canadian bacon, turkey sausage patties and pork sausage links.

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The included breakfast is one of the reasons we like this hotel, the others being the location (it's on the sun trolley route, a one-minute walk to the beach, a five-minute walk to the water taxi stop at the Bahia Mar and a ten-minute walk to shops and restaurants) price and the helpful staff.

On this first evening we walked up to Bubba Gump for dinner, which may not sound very exciting but we don't have this chain in Portugal and we like the food and find the prices to be not over the top expensive. And then we were whacked so we had an early night as we were planning on riding the water taxi the next day.

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22 November - Fort Lauderdale - Water taxi day

The last time we were in Fort Lauderdale we spent the day on the water taxi and enjoyed it so much we decided to do it again.

The Bahia Mar water taxi stop (no. 5) is just a five-minute walk from the BW. 

As we left the hotel we met a local lounging on the path.

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We thought it was cute but apparently they are an invasive species and a real pest, causing considerable destruction to people's gardens.

We caught the first northbound water taxi of the day (10.40 am at that stop) and rode the whole northbound loop before getting off at the Hilton Marina stop to change to the Hollywood route.

That took us past Port Everglades, where there were two ships, a Silversea one that I can't remember the name of and the Celebrity Silhouette, which we got a good close-up view of.

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On arrival in Hollywood we had some lunch at an instantly forgettable pizza place on the Broadwalk and then enjoyed wandering up and down along the beach, before catching the 5 pm water taxi back. It was actually late as it had to stop for the Celebrity Silhouette in the turning basin.

We hopped off at the Riverside Hotel stop, wandered up and down Las Olas and then went for dinner at the Cheesecake Factory (again, I know that's not very exciting, but this is another chain we don't have in Portugal, so it's a novelty for us) before catching what was probably the next-to-last water taxi back to the Bahia Mar. The crew on the one that had dropped us at the Riverside said the last one from that stop would be around 9 pm.

What a great day! I didn't really take any pics worth posting this time round, but here a few I took when we did the water taxi in December 2017. On that occasion we were lucky enough to be in the turning basin when Harmony and Indy sailed.

 

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It is our preference on cruise day not to go to the port early. This is because we consider our hotel stay to be part of our holiday and we prefer to relax by the pool or go for a wander on embarkation morning rather than sitting in a waiting room at the port. Our aim is to get on board just in time for the cabins opening up so that we don't have to lug our carry-ons around with us.

On this morning, we had a leisurely breakfast, packed up our stuff, checked out (check-out is at 11 am latest at the BW) and asked the hotel to hold our bags for us while we went for a wander. There was no charge for this.

At just after midday we ordered a Lyft ride, which arrived in under two minutes. The cost was just under $12 including tip. It took a while to get into Port Everglades; the driver got a telling off from the security guard at the gate for not having the ride details all ready to be checked but otherwise there were no issues.

The security line at the terminal was quite long; I think it took us about half an hour to get through it, but after that it was only a couple of minutes before we were checked in by an agent with a tablet. We had literally just been dinged on the ship when the announcement was made that the rooms were ready. Perfect timing!

For this cruise we booked a promenade view cabin on deck seven - no. 7593. This is located opposite the gifts and jewellery shop, towards the aft portion of the ship. We found the location to be very convenient and we were not disturbed by any noise. Location is important for these cabins; last year we were in 7279 on Navigator, across from the pub, and on several evenings we were inconvenienced by the live music playing until late. These cabins are a great value-for-money option. They are usually slightly cheaper than the standard ocean view cabins because they are classed as interiors, but they have the benefit of a window, so they don't feel as closed-in as the "real" interiors, even though there is no natural daylight. One important thing to bear in mind is that there are cabins opposite. You do need to keep the curtains closed when you have the light on for the sake of privacy. Things may be on view that would be best unseen! :51_scream:

Our cabin and the view from the window (please excuse DH's "cool" pose :4_joy:; the photo without him came out blurred).

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Once we had dumped our carry-ons, we headed down to Izumi's to book our specialty dining. We had the three-night package on this cruise and the first night had been reserved for us at Giovanni's, which was great since that was exactly what we wanted. The other days we wanted were day 3 in Chops and day 5 back in Giovanni's but we had to switch these around because of the Mystery Dinner being held in Giovanni's on day 5. On that day, the venue was closed for all other bookings. The reason for wanting these days was that we had checked the menus in the app (all of which proved to be accurate) and those were the days with the menus we did not particularly care for. We did not want to do Izumi for specialty dining because we are not sushi fans and Adventure does not have the hot rocks option.

After that it was time to start doing what everybody does best on a cruise ship - eat! So we headed up to the Windjammer.

There was a table outside where you could buy a beverage package if you hadn't bought one online. There was also a specialty dining table. With the exception of one rather annoying waiter from Chops, who came around the WJ targetting larger groups to try and sell them specialty dining, we did not notice anything in the way of hard sell. Or maybe we looked like cheapskates and nobody wanted to waste their time trying to sell us anything!

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The WJ was pretty busy but we were able to find a spot since the early boarders had already moved out to find their cabins. I did not take any photos of the food in the WJ as there were always lots of people around but we found there was plenty of variety and the quality was decent. I don't particularly like the layout of the WJ on the Voyager class ships; it seems to create long lines that are very difficult to break into if you just want to grab a single item rather than going all the way along the display.

After lunch we went to check out the Diamond Lounge, up on deck 14 (newbie Diamonds, remember :8_laughing:). We thought it was very nice. The coffee machine is available from 6 am to 11 pm. The DL is accessed through the Blue Moon lounge, which was used as an overflow for the happy hour since there were more than 400 D, D+ and P on board. I think they said 24 or 27 Ps.

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The views from the Blue Moon were amazing. We actually spotted what looked like an Oasis class ship sailing out of port. This was earlier than a normal sail-away time and I wondered if it might be one of the preview cruises on Oasis? Anybody know? You can see it in one of the pics below.

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There were several other ships sailing on this day and ours was the last to leave. By the time we sailed out of PE it was already dark, so I didn't get any photos.

Our luggage had arrived by the time we went back to the cabin after sail-away so we unpacked and put everything away. There was plenty of storage; we didn't need it all. And we managed to keep our cabin very tidy for the whole trip. Our stateroom attendant must have loved us, he had so little to do! 

Dinner, as I mentioned, was at Giovanni's. Unfortunately, excitement got the better of me and I failed miserably in my task of taking photos of the menu (forgivable; it's on the app and hasn't changed in years anyway) or of my dinner choices (unpardonable. Sack the blogger! :24_stuck_out_tongue:). 

Since there was no after-dinner show, our evening was rounded off by having a wander around the shops and making a small contribution to the casino, which seemed to be particularly tight-fisted on this cruise. 

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2 hours ago, FionaMG said:

It is our preference on cruise day not to go to the port early. This is because we consider our hotel stay to be part of our holiday and we prefer to relax by the pool or go for a wander on embarkation morning rather than sitting in a waiting room at the port. Our aim is to get on board just in time for the cabins opening up so that we don't have to lug our carry-ons around with us.

On this morning, we had a leisurely breakfast, packed up our stuff, checked out (check-out is at 11 am latest at the BW) and asked the hotel to hold our bags for us while we went for a wander. There was no charge for this.

At just after midday we ordered a Lyft ride, which arrived in under two minutes. The cost was just under $12 including tip. It took a while to get into Port Everglades; the driver got a telling off from the security guard at the gate for not having the ride details all ready to be checked but otherwise there were no issues.

The security line at the terminal was quite long; I think it took us about half an hour to get through it, but after that it was only a couple of minutes before we were checked in by an agent with a tablet. We had literally just been dinged on the ship when the announcement was made that the rooms were ready. Perfect timing!

For this cruise we booked a promenade view cabin on deck seven - no. 7593. This is located opposite the gifts and jewellery shop, towards the aft portion of the ship. We found the location to be very convenient and we were not disturbed by any noise. Location is important for these cabins; last year we were in 7279 on Navigator, across from the pub, and on several evenings we were inconvenienced by the live music playing until late. These cabins are a great value-for-money option. They are usually slightly cheaper than the standard ocean view cabins because they are classed as interiors, but they have the benefit of a window, so they don't feel as closed-in as the "real" interiors, even though there is no natural daylight. One important thing to bear in mind is that there are cabins opposite. You do need to keep the curtains closed when you have the light on for the sake of privacy. Things may be on view that would be best unseen! :51_scream:

Our cabin and the view from the window (please excuse DH's "cool" pose :4_joy:; the photo without him came out blurred).

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We like the promade rooms as well and it is about location,location. Some can be noisy. Thanks for pics.

 

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13 minutes ago, WannaCruise said:

Thank you for the photos!  I like having the band like that between the two pools.  Diamond lounge looks nice....sigh....someday.  

That's not a bad price for the drink package on board, but still better to purchase beforehand.  Out of curiosity, did you see the drink card later in the cruise?

My pleasure, thanks for following. :14_relaxed:

I did not see any mention at all of the drink card. Nor did I see any mention of the coffee card, for that matter. That is not to say 100% that they were not available but they were not advertised in the Compass, which I would have expected if they were being offered.

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This was essentially a typical sea day.

It started bright and (way too) early with the Cruise Critic Meet & Mingle at the ungodly hour of 9 am! :51_scream: Come on, guys! We're supposed to be on holiday here! Anyway despite the early start it was reasonably well attended. There were 3 or 4 pretty boring raffle prizes (we didn't win) but the Activities Manager, Kelly from Alabama, came across as very personable and bubbly and she did a good of job of getting people to interact.

The M&M was followed by a cabin crawl that was organised by one of the people on our CC roll call. I had never done one and thought it was a lot of fun. We got to see about 10 different types of cabin, ranging from a tiny "real" interior to a grand suite and a panoramic ocean view suite. Would that I could, sigh...

The rest of the day was spent doing (or, in our case, mostly watching) typical sea day activities such as pool games, flow rider and mini-golf (we did actually play the mini-golf; we are both completely rubbish at it so there was a fair bit of cheating going on :8_laughing:).

Some random pics from around the ship:

Lively pool deck:

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Quieter spots:

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Sporty activities:

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A model of Vision of the Seas (I don't know why that's here on the Adventure):

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The promenade by night:

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And our first towel animal of the cruise:

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We had dinner tonight in the MDR. We were at an 8-top on deck five. The other six people had all eaten there on the first night, but one young couple from somewhere in South America never showed again, which is hardly surprising given that they were on their honeymoon and had been seated with a bunch of old fogeys. 

I once again failed miserably in my duty to photograph my food. However, I can tell you that I had the seafood vol-au-vent for starters (underwhelming), the roasted beef tenderloin for mains (delicious and very tender but you need to ask for it to be medium rare; if you ask for medium well it comes out overdone and dry, as someone else at our table discovered), and the Royal chocolate cake for dessert. To me, a dessert is not dessert if it doesn't have chocolate in it and this classic has never let me down. One of my favourites.

I need to wrap this up now for today. I will post more tomorrow. Many, many thanks again for bearing with me. :14_relaxed:

 

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1 hour ago, Dan Curtis said:

Thanks for the pics, looks like nice weather on sea day and a crowded top deck.

We had great weather for practically the whole cruise. Only on the last 2 sea days could you feel any motion, and only on the very last day did it stay cloudy and cool for most of the day.

This was a sold-out cruise with a much younger demographic than might normally be expected on 8-nighter, undoubtedly due to the fact that it was a holiday sailing. There were lots of kids and teens but I must say I never saw any behaving badly.

Our MDR waitress told us there were 4000+ passengers on board but this turned out to be slightly exaggerated;  the actual number was around 3900, a hefty figure nonetheless. 

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Day 3 - 25 November - Labadee

Cruise Compass:

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Today was our first port of call. This was our second visit to Labadee; the first one had been the previous year on our Navigator cruise and oddly enough was on the exact same date.

Arrival was at 7 am so we were not up and about to see it. We actually got off at about 10 am and the first thing I wanted to do was to go up to the look-out where you can see the whole ship front-on. On our previous cruise we did this in the late afternoon, on our way back to ship, and I wanted to get a photo with different lighting. You can see what a difference this makes. Both photos were taken from the exact same vantage point, admittedly with different devices, but neither device is very sophisticated - one is a smartphone and the other is a tablet - so I doubt that would account for much of the difference.

25 Nov 2018:

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25 November 2019:

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After that we headed over to the tram stop to get the tram to Columbus Cove. On the way we spotted a massive chair. I don't know if it was already there last year; if it was I did not notice, but you know what it's like when you visit a place for the first time - you need a circle of eyes all round your head to see everything!

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Note that the chair is not actually on a slant; it's just that my DH can't be trusted with a camera! :8_laughing:

On arrival at Columbus Cove we got sorted out with a couple of loungers in a shady spot very close to the water. I love that you can see the whole ship from here.

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We went for lunch at 1 pm by which time there were no lines at all and headed back to the ship not long after, since all aboard was at 3.30 pm. Having missed the ship's arrival, we made a point of being up top for sail-away to get some nice pics. The view of the bay is gorgeous.

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This evening we had dinner again at Giovanni's. We had the meat plank appetiser to share, which we had also ordered on day 1, and enjoyed it again.

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For mains we ordered the filet (on day 1 we had the gamberetti, which we liked a lot, wish I had remembered to take a photo). The filet was absolutely excellent (as it had been the year before on Navigator). Interestingly, after he had placed our dishes in front of us, our server asked us to cut into the steak to make sure it had been cooked to our satisfaction. This is the first and only time that has happened. I did remember to take a picture but only after devouring half of the steak. Ooops! :11_blush:

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After dinner we went to see the headliner show in the theatre, which was an Eagles tribute band called "The Long Run". They were good but they played mostly later songs; I would have liked a few more of the earlier ones. The whole theatre sang along when they played "Desperado".

I much prefer to have a show after dinner, like this. We always have late seating so frequently the show is before dinner and we end up missing it because that's the time that I like to go to the gym and DH likes to soak in the hot tub.

The show was followed by another visit to the tight-fisted casino before we called it a night.

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Day 4 - 26 November - San Juan, Puerto Rico

Cruise Compass:

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Despite the weather forecast in the Compass forewarning us of cloudy skies with a chance of rain we had a lovely sunny morning prior to our 1 pm arrival in SJ and sunshine for virtually the whole afternoon. There were plenty of activities on the pool and sports decks, which we enjoyed watching.

Shortly before 1 pm we headed up to the quiet area at the very front on deck 12 to watch the ship's arrival. We had a fantastic view from up here.

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Our plan for today was simply to take a leisurely stroll up to the El Morro Fort and back. Before leaving the port area we turned left and paused to take a pic of the ship.

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Then we continued along the Paseo de la Princesa.

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And on up to the fort at a very relaxed pace.

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The fort is amazing. Even if you are not really into history it is well worth a visit. The standard adult ticket cost $7 and allowed admission into both forts on the same day. We did not really have time to do this since they close at 6 pm and that would have been pushing DH's tolerance level anyway. :8_laughing:

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While we were in the fort we spotted the Norwegian Encore sailing into port.

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On our way back down from the fort we happened on the cathedral and went in to have a look. It is quite simple but is attractively decorated.

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We also found a gastronomy shop where I bought some spicy sauces to bring home with me.

By the time we got back to the ship it was almost dinner time. Tonight's dinner was in the MDR. Here is the menu but I am afraid it's a rubbish pic, very blurred. My bad. :11_blush:

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Tonight's menu was very underwhelming. We both had the seafood cake for starters, which was OK, and the New York Strip Loin for mains. Once again, if we had ordered it done medium-well it would have been overcooked and dry. It was just OK done medium-rare. I forgot to take pics of both of these.

I did, however, remember to take a pic of my dessert, the warm dark chocolate cookie. I had this for the first time last year on Navigator and really enjoyed it. I am happy to report that it did not disappoint this time round either. Yum! :24_stuck_out_tongue:

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After dinner we went up to the top deck where there was a dancing under the stars party going on. There wasn't a great deal else to do this evening due to the late departure, which meant that the shops stayed closed and the casino did not open until 11.45 pm. By that time we had called it a night, so we saved a few dollars! :8_laughing:

We had our second towel animal tonight.

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Day 5 - 27 November - St Thomas

Cruise Compass:

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I touched briefly on our day in St Thomas back in an earlier post while we were actually on board since the internet allowed me to upload a couple of pics but I'll go into a bit more detail here in case anyone else might be interested in doing the ship-sponsored excursion that we did.

The excursion was the 5-star island tour. This included a half-hour stop at Mountain Top to admire the view, sample some drinks and shop, followed by two hours at Magens Bay Beach and a further two hours for shopping in downtown Charlotte Amalie before being returned to the ship. All in all it is an excursion that lasts for about six and a half hours.

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The excursion was exactly as described, except that the description failed to mention that the transport is in the open truck-type vehicles. I was expecting an actual bus, which was not an issue for us but could have been for others.

We were to meet at 9.15 on the pier. We got there at 9.10 and were practically the last ones to arrive so we went in the last of the several vehicles doing the trip. Our driver/guide was Percy and he was pleasant and informative.

We did not actually pay for the excursion since we used promotional OBC to "buy" it but I did keep obsessively checking the cruise planner for sales and cancelled and re-booked twice to take advantage of price drops. Under these circumstances I would have to say that it was definitely worth the "money" but we probably wouldn't have bothered with it if we had paying with the real thing. It was probably worth the price if you got it at the cheaper rate, not least for the sake of convenience. If you wanted to do all three elements of the tour, it would have been quite a hassle to do them under your own steam.

The highlight of the tour was, by far, the stop at Magens Bay. Although we have been to St Thomas several times before, we had never actually made it to this particular beach but this will be our go-to place on any future stops at this port. I can't say enough good things about this beach. We are not really beach people and 2 - 3 hours is usually plenty for us. We will spend that time strolling along the edge of the water and this beach is long enough (a mile long, the guide said) to let us do that. 

We were dropped off beside the toilets and changing rooms roughly in the middle of the beach. If you went to the left it was much quieter and if you went to the right, where the bar and restaurant are located, it is much busier. So there is something for everyone. I was amazed to see a female bar server walking along the beach carrying what must have been a really heavy tray of drinks and wearing a belt that had about a dozen bottles of water and cans of soda in it! And how she was ever able to find the folks who had ordered those drinks I cannot begin to imagine! :63_astonished:

Anyway, we really enjoyed our day.

Dinner tonight was the third and last of our three-night dining package and it was at Chops. I completely forgot to take any photos but I do remember what we ordered. We had the jumbo lump crab cake for starters, which was OK. I thought it had a slightly odd crumbly texture. This was followed the the filet, which was a bit of a let down after the one we had in Giovanni's. It was overcooked and not particularly tasty, and although the sautéed mushrooms were nice, the mashed potatoes were not as good as Giovanni's either, in terms of both taste and texture. I wish I had not allowed myself to be swayed by our waiter as I had intended having the rack of lamb, which I have heard is very good at Chops. For dessert I had the red velvet cake. Having heard lots of good things about it I had wanted to try it last year on Navigator and for some reason it was not on the menu then. So I ordered that and it was very good. I did not particularly care for the waiter in Chops, who I felt was doing some serious tip-fishing. I had already seen him previously in the WJ doing some hard sell at a large table next to us.

We had a rather surprising note left in our cabin today :51_scream:

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I can't begin to imagine how I would have felt it that had happened to us. Or that somebody could have a bag that was not theirs in their stateroom without realising it... I wonder if they ever managed to find out what happened to it.

Tonight was the Love & Marriage Game, which we always enjoy, but we missed it because although it was mentioned on the inside of the Compass it was not listed on the back. Boo. :44_frowning2:

So DH made his usual small contribution to the casino and we called it a night.

 

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Day 6 - 28 November - Thanksgiving - St Martin

Cruise compass:

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Our plan for today was just to stroll into town and do some shopping.

It was a busy day in St Martin, with five ships in port. Apart from ourselves there was the Regal Princess, which was parked alongside us, the Aida Diva, P&O's Oceana and and a Silversea one.

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We ended up only buying some rum cakes before heading back to the port area where we also bought some guava berry jam at one of the kiosks. There seemed to be a great deal more "tourist junk" on offer than I remembered from previous visits but we enjoyed our stroll nevertheless.

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Back on board, there was sporting action on both sides, with the same football match being shown on the big screens both on our ship and on the Regal. We watched for a few minutes but couldn't work out what was going on. :8_laughing: I must say the quality of the image was very good.

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Sail-away afforded us a great view of the other ships.

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This being Thanksgiving there was a special menu in the MDR, which I posted earlier, as well as pics of the food, since they had finally fixed the internet by that time. 

We were ready in time for the 7 pm show this evening but although it was listed on the back of the compass as "production show" it was actually a headliner show with a comedian, so we didn't go as comedy in English largely goes over DH's head.

The evening was rounded off with our usual brief visit to the casino.

 

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Day 7 - 29 November - At Sea

Cruise Compass:

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Today was the first of our two sea days on the run back to Fort Lauderdale and we were lucky to have another good day weather-wise.

We went to the Next Cruise presentation, mainly in the hope of winning one of the raffle prizes, which were actually quite decent and included some spa stuff. Obviously we didn't win a thing and the presentation itself offered up nothing we didn't know already.

This was followed by a slot pull that was organised by a member of our CC roll call. We had never done one before and it was quite fun even if the stingy machine did not let us come out ahead, except for the highest scorer who got the left-over change and probably came out a few dollars better off. Admittedly we were only a couple of dollars down at the end and it was exciting when we were actually winning.

Otherwise our daytime activities were essentially a repeat of other sea days, sunshine, spectating pool deck activities - it was the belly flop contest today but we only saw a bit of it because we were invited to a birthday party - and then the ice show. I would like to say the ice show was amazing, and I'm sure it was... however, the large slice of the fantastic chocolate cake provided by the ship for the person celebrating their birthday, followed by a late lunch that we finished just minutes before the start of the performance both took their toll... I nodded off practically the moment I sat down in Studio B and when I wakened up again they were wrapping it all up! I didn't know whether I should laugh or cry! There was no chance to catch it again as this was the last performance of the cruise. :8_laughing::11_blush:

Tonight's performance in the theatre was an Adele tribute by a singer called Amy Jo, so we went along to that. I thought she was pretty good even if Adele's songs are a bit downbeat for a cruise.

Tonight was also formal, aka lobster, night in the MDR. I won't re-post the pics that I posted previously but here is the menu:

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And after dinner they had the inevitable 70s party in the Promenade. The early part was not particularly well-attended, which did not really surprise me given the demographics on board but as it went on it got a bit more lively and towards the end the Promenade was pretty packed.

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This evening we received official notification of our refund for the internet problems.

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And when we got back to our cabin at bedtime, we had a towel animal on our bed bearing unwelcome gifts. A stark reminder that our cruise was drawing to a close. Boo. :44_frowning2:

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Day 8 (final day, no, no, no!) - 30 November - At Sea

Cruise Compass:

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Departure information:

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We definitely enjoy having two seas days at the end of a cruise as we find it to be more relaxing than having a port call.

We went to the Captain's Corner, which was interesting as usual, and to the Promenade to purchase the obligatory t-shirts, and then to the photo gallery to order our photos. We only ordered the two free ones we were entitled to as Diamond perks. Great perk, that one, saved us some pennies! :5_smiley:

At lunch in the WJ they had a big chocolate section and for once I was able to get a pic without anybody in front of it. Don't these apples look yummy? I didn't try them though because there had also been a very big cake display and I sampled several...

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There was some interesting artwork around the ship that I would have liked to photograph but just never got round to; either I didn't have my phone with me at the time or there would be lots of people around, but I did manage to snap this one thanks to a really sweet little boy telling his mum to "wait a bit, the lady's taking a photo". Awwww. :17_heart_eyes:

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The weather was actually a good bit cooler today and the ship had been rocking quite noticeably since dinner time the previous night. This was apparently due to the massive weather system 200 miles to the north, but it did calm down enough that we managed to get a last couple of hours of sunbathing in and watch folks falling in on the flowrider.

Dinner was again in the MDR and it was one of my favourite menus:

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We skipped the actual starters and had the tiger shrimp as a starter instead:

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I followed that with the rack of lamb, which was very good:

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And rounded it all off with the brownie from the kids' menu:

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Then I had to go and pack, since I had staunchly refused to do it during the day. But let's face it, how long do you need to just throw everything into your suitcase? 

We also had to go and get the correct tags for our bags. We had been given tag number 8 but actually needed number 1 according to the departure information.

And since we had set up a cash account the last thing that had to be done before turning in for the night was settle up. This is where our new Diamond status really came into its own. Not counting gratuities, our onboard spend was under $200 and most of that was down to the post-cruise excursion we booked. Definitely a worthwhile status.

We were thankful for the fact that they gave us our hour back on the last night since we were having to get up very early the next morning. The meeting time for our post-cruise excursion to the Everglades was 7.30 am! :44_frowning2:

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On 12/10/2019 at 5:13 PM, FionaMG said:

I nodded off practically the moment I sat down in Studio B and when I wakened up again they were wrapping it all up! I

On our first cruise, we went to the ice show on the first night, and my wife promptly fell asleep.  

I haven't let her forget.  ? 

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9 hours ago, Srp431 said:

Thanks for the photos and the cruise compass photos , and the MDR menus

My pleasure. Thanks for following along. :14_relaxed:

I also have this MDR menu, which I think is from night 3, one of the nights when we did speciality dining. I went up to the Diamond Lounge to get a photo of it, so disregard the date stamp as it's not relevant.

I did also take a pic of the night 5 (?) menu at the same time but it was too blurred to be of any use. In any event, if you have the app, the menus in that were spot on for the whole cruise except Thanksgiving which was obviously and exception.

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