GET AWAY!

We just returned from a 7 Day Southern Caribbean Cruise on the Celebrity Summit. This is a review of the trip!

Friday, November 12

We were up way too early to head to Hobby Airport. Our flight left Houston at 6:05am. We arrived in Atlanta a little before 10am (their time.) During our layover we ate breakfast and packed a lunch to take on the next leg of our trip to San Juan. We arrived in San Juan a little before 5pm. We got a taxi at the airport in San Juan, very little wait. The cab ride from the airport to the Marriott Stellaris was about 20 minutes long. Once we got checked in to the hotel we went to dinner at Pamela’s. It was easily one of the best meals I’ve ever had! Their webpage is http://www.numero1guesthouse.com/pamelas.html. If you ever find yourself in San Juan, you’ve got to try it! After dinner we went to La Concha for after dinner drinks and people watching. We saw Darryl Strawberry at the hotel. Stephen says he used to be a ball player. After La Concha, we headed back to the hotel to rest up before the next day. Our A/C in our room wasn’t working, but hotel maintenance got it fixed real quick!

Saturday, November 13

We woke up around 8am and relaxed before we repacked our bags. We met Mom and Dad in the hotel lobby at 11 and grabbed a cab to take us to the port. It was about a 20 minute cab ride to the port. Once we got to the port we handed our bags off to the porters and set off to check-in. We got checked in very fast! Stephen stopped and purchased the Soda Package before we stepped onboard. By 12:30 we were on the ship. After grabbing our complimentary Mimosas, we went to the buffet to get lunch. Mom and Dad had some issues at check-in, so they met up with us about 45 minutes later in the buffet. The buffet on the ship is wonderful! The food is always fresh and warm, unlike some other cruise lines we’ve been on. There were always waiters standing nearby to help me with my tray if my hands were full. My favorite thing about the buffet is the large salad bar! They have all the yummy salad topping you can’t get just anywhere. After lunch, we decided to go on our own tour of the ship. The Summit is a medium size ship, so the whole tour probably took less than an hour to be totally comfortable with the “lay of the land.” After our tour, it was announced that we could go to our cabins. We hung out there and unpacked once our luggage arrived. We also met our cabin steward, Menino. He was a great steward. He was always in and out so quickly that we rarely saw him. He also always helped us out whenever we needed something. He was quick and helpful! We have been on cruises in the past where the stewards always want to clean when we need our room. We never had to plan our schedules around Menino needing in our room. At 4pm we met up with some Cruise Critic members for a Poker Cabin Crawl. How it works: Each person pays $3 to participate. You drawl a card at each of the five cabins you tour. At the end of the cabin, the person with the best hand – WINS! This ends up covering your gratuities for the week. Stephen and I had a host cabin and participated. Sadly, we didn’t win. We did meet a lot of fellow cruise addicts! After the Poker Crawl was the lifeboat drill. If you’ve been to one, you’ve been to them all. This was my 29^th cruise, so it was nothing new. After the lifeboat drill we hung out in Mom and Dad’s Royal Suite until dinner time. They had an awesome suite! It’s a shame their Butler was mediocre, at best. Dinner on Saturday night was at the specialty restaurant onboard, The Normandie. It was very yummy! Dad and Stephen got dishes that were prepared tableside, so that’s always entertaining. After dinner we made some donations at the casino before retiring for the evening.

Sunday, November 14

We were in St. Croix, USVI on Sunday. I had never been to St. Croix and unfortunately the uncooperative weather kept me from forming a really solid opinion of it. What I can tell you is that it is tricky to drive there. Mom and Dad rented a car. In St. Croix you drive on the left side of the road. The roads all have like 5 names and many are only one way. It was a bit tricky to navigate! The beach we went to was at the Buccaneer Resort. It rained almost the whole time we were there, so we only hung around for a couple of hours before heading back to the ship. I’d like to go back someday when the weather is better and we have our bearings. Sunday evening we met our waiters Sheldon and Omar. They far exceeded my expectations for service during this cruise! They were so happy and laughed a lot. They would take time to learn about us and let us learn about them too. They smiled a lot, and that makes a huge difference. We made our nightly donation to the casino and turned in for another restful night of sleep.

Monday, November 15

We were in St. Kitts on Tuesday. This was not our first trip to St. Kitts. We hopped in a cab for the short ride over to the Marriott. We purchased a day use room at the resort. OMG! This is the best way to travel for so many reasons. 1) You get access to all the resort amenities – beach, pools, restaurants, chairs, bars 2) You get the discounted guest rate for golf – Dad and Stephen spent the first part of the day golfing 3) You have somewhere private and nice to get cleaned up before you head back to the ship. If you haven’t done this before, you should consider it for your future trips! The beach in St. Kitts was pretty nice, but too many peddlers! We only hung out down there long enough to be offered to hold a monkey in a diaper, buy some bracelets clearly made in China, and be repeatedly offered braids and massages! Off to the pool we went! The pool was gorgeous and not crowded at all! It was a beautiful and relaxing afternoon. The boys joined us after golf for an hour at the pool. We got cleaned up and checked out before taking a cab back to the ship. There’s a lot of shopping right off the ship in St. Kitts. If you needed anything, you don’t have to go too far from the ship to find it.

Tuesday, November 16

This was Dominica day. We’d been there recently so we opted to spend this day onboard this ship as a faux sea day. Mom and I went to the spa in the morning then attempted to lie out, but it was SO INCREDIBLY HOT. I didn’t even last an hour before I was back down in the room cooling off. We spend the rest of the day hanging out in Mom and Dad’s Suite on their huge balcony.

Wednesday, November 17

On Wednesday we were in Grenada. This was another port I had never been to before. We got a day use room at the Grenada Grand Resort. It wasn’t as nice as the Marriott in St. Kitts, but the beach was excellent! The sand is white and as soft as flour. We fought some rain, but waited it out under an ocean-side gazebo. I’d love to go back to Grenada. Everything about it projected peace and calm! It was a beautiful day!

Thursday, November 18

Stephen had a belly ache on Thursday, so Mom, Dad, and I set off to Pigeon Point Beach in Tobago without him. The beach was pretty nice. The sand is more of a gravel texture until you get about 40 feet out into the water where it gets soft. It was very crowded at the beach. It seems like everyone on the cruise ship had decided to do the same thing. There were peddlers offering the usual “Made in China” items and pot. We declined both! This wasn’t my favorite beach. It doesn’t even make my top 10. I’d have probably enjoyed a tour of the island more than going to the beach.

Friday, November 19

A cold, wet sea day headed back to San Juan. We couldn’t lie out because it was too windy and rainy. Stephen and I saw a movie in the cinema on the ship and packed to return home. We did some shopping onboard and made our daily donations to the casino. We said goodbyes to our favorite staff!

Saturday, November 20

We got off the ship around 9:30am. We all picked up our bags and cleared customs and went to the airport and waited for our 2:48pm flight. It was a long wait in the airport. We had another layover in ATL before arriving in Houston around 10:30pm. It was a long day of traveling. The only perk of the long day of travel was that AirTran had free WIFI! It was awesome being able to access the internet from 30,000+ ft!

All in all, it was a good cruise. I wish we would have had some better weather, but that was completely outside anyone’s control. I’m not ready to be back to reality, but at least it’s just a 3 day work week. We’ll head to Victoria for Thanksgiving on Wednesday evening.