12-3-17 St. Lucia:

Today we woke to sunny skies in beautiful St. Lucia. 

While we waited for the ship to clear customs, we had breakfast and waited in the Lido restaurant.  I realized I hadn't taken a picture of the Oprah shirts that we were given at embarkation, so I took this of the guy at the next table.  I really liked the shirts.  It was also neat so many people wearing them throughout the cruise.  Even the men were wearing them.  In fact, I probably saw more men wearing them then women.  The front of the shirt had a small printing on the upper part of one side. 

2015 (April 17- May 1) Southern Caribbean Cruise: St. Thomas; St. Barths; St. Lucia; Barbados; Grenada; Bonaire; and Curacoa

 We enjoyed our 2014 Maasdam cruise so much, that when  we received an email with an OBC offer if we booked a future cruise --- we checked the Maasdam itineraries and decided to go back to the Southern Caribbean in 2015---but for 14 nights this time (our longest cruise yet) and with some new (to us) ports of call (Grenada,Bonaire, and Curacao).  We booked a Spa Oceanview since we like being higher on the ship and it was almost affordable.  A couple months after booking our 2015 cruise, they offered a free Beverage Package and a cheaper fare for new bookings.  Since it was well before final payment, I called and got the reduced fare and the Beverage package, but had to give up our "welcome back OBC" which was only $50@.  After that, we waited about 7 months for the cruise to finally get here.  I was surprised the rates never lowered again.  Since we're not big drinkers, I didn't figure we'd get much use out of the Beverage package and would have given it up for a lower fare.  No further reduction came, but it turned out really nice having the Beverage Package.  On board they were charging $44.99/person/day for the package which included up to 15 drinks a day as long as they were under $7@ ---per person!   We did end up using the drink package a lot---a couple beers a day, bottled water, soda, hot chocolate... .

2015 April--The Maasdam (suite A 182) and around the ship:

 

2015-4-20   St. Thomas---8am-6pm:

 

2015-4-21  St. Barths (8-3)  Shell Beach:

 

2015-4-22  St. Lucia---8am-3pm: Pigeon Island

 

2015-4-23  Barbados (8-5): Folkestone

 

2015-4-24  Grenada (8-5): Aquarium beach 

 

2015-4-26   Bonaire (8-5): Eden Beach (Spice Island)

 

2015-4-27  Curacao (8-6) Blue Bay

 

  
We were suppose to have a stop at Half Moon Cay, but the surf was too rough, so we ended up having another sea day.  Although I was disappointed, I was really happy with the way the rest of the cruise went and the beautiful weather we had at all the other ports.  Can't wait until we board another ship for ports unknown!

2015-4-22  St. Lucia---8am-3pm: Pigeon Island

 

We'd been to St. Lucia a couple cruises ago.   

 At that time, we took a taxi to Pigeon Island and really enjoyed it, so we decided to do the same this time.  This time the taxi fare was about $25/person rt as I recall, plus there was a $7 entrance fee into the park. 

 Later I hiked the mountain for views of the coastline.  There are also fort ruins, restrooms, and a restaurant in the park. 

A short walk to the left brought us to the beautiful Caribbean side of the park.

 We went to the next cove and parked our stuff by a bench and took off into the water.

Looking back to the beach from the water.  Lots of ship excursion people showed up later, but they didn't get to stay as long as we did.  Here the excursion crew were setting up for an activity where you walk along the bottom of the bay with a big helmet on your head that has air pumped into it.  

 There were tons of fish along the rocky areas.
Here is a cigar wrasse

 a trumpet fish among schools of juvenile fish

 a porcupine puffer

 a squid

 a juvenile butterflyfish

 blue head wrasse

 a type of file fish

 a very large wrasse (looking deceivingly small here because I couldn't get very close to it)

 a large Spotlight Parrotfish

 a large Hogfish

 Hadn't seen one of these guys before but it looks to me to be a type of Emporer Fish

 There were several of these jellyfish there, but they didn't seem to have tentacles.

 near the point that led to the Atlantic Ocean were lots of large barrel corals

 an eel

 In the shallows by the shore were lots of juvenile fish and these funny looking Dr. Seuss-looking plants.

 a Squirrel fish

 blue tangs munching on some sea weed.

 after about 3 hours we decided to get out and change clothes so as not to get the taxi wet.  They had nice restrooms with changing rooms in them.

 We still had time before the taxi was due back, so I hiked up the mountain.  We pretty much snorkeled the 2 bays to the near left and all the way to the lower right of this picture, just before the Caribbean met the Atlantic Ocean.

 Close up of the 2 bays.  The furthest bay is out of the park and connected to a hotel/resort---maybe even the Sandals that we passed on the way there.

 The fort at the top of the hill.

 Back at the port, I couldn't resist admiring the flowers.  When we left St. Louis, everything was still brown and dormant.  It was so nice seeing greenery and flowers again!

 More pretty flowers.

 Even the white ones were pretty.

 These were by far my favorite.

 I don't think we left the port at the scheduled departure time.  We were on the side of the ship facing the dock and watched several groups of people arriving back to the port long after the be back by time.  Some ran, some walked slowly, one guy even drove a car to the circle in front of the shops and just left it there.
Then we continued on our way down to Soufriere  to tender in people who took the ship's excursions there.  No kids in little boats here "diving for dollars" this time.  There were water patrols there instead. 

 A final look towards the Pitons before shoving off.

2012 Noordam 11 night cruise

11 night Southern Caribbean Cruise

After our last 2 November Caribbean cruises in less then ideal weather conditions, you would think we'ld learn not to cruise the Caribbean in hurricane season!  But we persisted and gave it another try.  This time we did our longest cruise yet---11 nights on the Noordam and had almost perfect weather the whole time!   We actually booked this cruise while we were on the Eurodam last year.

I chose this cruise , (Holland America's Noordam) mainly because it went to St. Lucia.  I've always wanted to see St. Lucia.  The cruise also included stops in St. Maarten, Barbados, Dominica, Martinique, St. Thomas, and Half Moon Cay.  It was very port intensive, which I loved---6 port days in a row, another port later.  Ken's more of a sea day fan, but he held up pretty well.

2012 Noordam ship

2012-11-5,6, and 7  Up to and including our first 3 nights:  Sea days

2012-11-8  St. Maarten 

2012-11-9  St. Lucia

2012-11-10  Barbados

2012-11-11 Martinique

2012-11-12  Dominica

2012-11-13 St. Thomas


After 6 port days in a row, the next day was a welcomed sea day!  Even though I'm not a big fan of sea days, the day of rest was nice.  Althought my plans for sleeping in didn't go so well.  Somewhere in the Caribbean waters I encountered what I assume was sea lice---invisible to the eye, larvae or jellyfish or other stinging ocean critters that attacked me---and I ended up with an extremely itchy rash.  I had this happen before on a couple of our trips to Hawaii (out of about 20 trips to Hawaii), so I wasn't surprised.  Apparently they don't bother everyone---like Ken---but they sure like me.  Took about 5 days for the extreme itching to subside.  At least it happened near the end of our cruise.

2012-11-15 Halfmoon Cay

his was Ken's 4th cruise, my 10th.   Other than my first cruise (when my Dad almost drowned), I haven't had a bad one yet (not counting weather).  I really enjoyed seeing the new places and revisiting the ones we've been to.  We enjoyed it so much we even did the onboard booking for the ship board credit for the next one.  The $200 ship board credit for booking onboard last year and the $100 OBC for having CCL stock came in really handy this year.  After gratuities of $12/day@ , the Canelleto dinner, and a couple other items we bought onboard, we only owed $56 when we debarked. 

Now to start dreaming about where to go next!





2012-11-9  St. Lucia:

Today we woke up heading into the port of Castries, St. Lucia.  This was our first time here.  The view from our verandah was beautiful. 
 The airport runway.

 one of the prettier ports we've been to.

 the port

I spent quite a bit of time researching and trying to figure out where we should go snorkeling.  Ideally, I would have like to go snorkel by the Pitons, but wouldn't have enough time to go there and back.  There were excursions that went there, but they were really expensive.  The ship picked those passengers up at Soufierre, but they would not pick up passengers on private tours.  So I decided to give Peanut Island a try.  It was just on the other side of Castries and it turned out to be perfect.

We headed off the ship to the taxi area again and were directed to one going to Pigeon Island (no longer an island, it was artificially joined to the mainland in 1972).   Even the ride there and back was interesting.
 Marina along our way

 Again we made arrangements for the driver to come back and get us.  Our $20@ rt fare included the $6@ entrance fee into Pigeon Island National Landmark.   The island is a historic site with numerous forts such as an 18th century British fort and Fort Rodney both used by the British to spy on French Ships from neighboring Martinique.

It had a nice secluded beach here.  We had it basically to ourselves for a couple hours before the tours started to arrive (except for the nice lady offering beach chairs for a small fee).

heading in

 Snorkeling here was pretty good.  I even swam out to the far point where the Atlantic ocean meets the Caribbean.  It was rougher by the ocean, but the Caribbean bay was really smooth.  We spent a couple hours snorkeling here.

 A couple species of wrasses I hadn't seen before

One of the many trumpet fish we saw, but the first one I've seen that was bluish.  I know they will turn yellow, but didn't know they also can turn blue.

 Lots of schools of fish.

 the cruise ship excursion people arriving.

Back to snorkeling.

 I also spent some time wandering around the ruins of the old fort here.

As we waited for our taxi to return, we sat on the other side of the park and gazed out at the Atlantic Ocean.  The side we snorkeled at was part of the Caribbean.

All too soon it was time to go back to the ship.  It was interesting seeing some of the American influence in Castries on our way back.

I would have liked to have taken a land tour, but being in port only 6 or 7 hours just doesn't leave enough time to do more then one thing.  

Cruising out of the port

 Our cruise ship did do a scenic narrated tour of the coastline to Soufriere where the Pitons are.  

 I couldn't help but think of Kauai as we cruised along the coastline of St. Lucia!

 such a beautiful island!

 Close to  Soufriere.

 Soufriere

The ship stopped here to tender in passengers who did a couple of the excursions that ended here.  

While we waited for the passengers, boatloads of youngsters came out yelling stuff like, "will dive for money".  

 Don't know how noone got hurt with all the boats flying around and kids jumping into the water for money and fruit that people threw to them from the ship.

 The whole tendering process took well over an hour.  But I enjoyed watching the sunset and seeing the clouds changing colors over the Pitons.  I would love to go back here someday to one of the Sandals resorts.

Pretty nice sunset.---even looking towards the East.

Towards the WEst

One last view towards Soufierre as we sailed away.

St. Lucia did not disappoint!  In fact, I'm probably more impressed with it then I expected to be.