Travel

The sunny weather we had been experiencing so far changed a bit as we made our way into Philipsburg, Sint Maarten.

We could see a few clouds coming over the hills as we approached the pier.

It was shaping up to be a busy port day in Sint Maarten. 4 ships were scheduled to make a call. P&O Britannia had already docked as we came in.

We anticipated a few showers, but as our stateroom attendant wisely said: “They have showers and sun in the Tropics, so you can have rainbows.”

As we headed into the pier, an old friend was following us into Philipsburg. We would recognize her anywhere.

Marella Voyager is the former Celebrity Mercury. We have cruised aboard Mercury to Alaska and the Bahamas and made many friends aboard her. Sarah and Dave cruised from Australia to New Zealand aboard Mercury. It was good to see her again.

We left the Reflection and headed downtown. It began to rain lightly – just enough to dampen you, not soak you completely.

Eventually we stopped on the porch of a restaurant until the rain stopped.

Near the restaurant. Not much rain coming down, but there were pudddles everywhere.

It’s easier to walk along the waterfront now as the town has installed a stone walkway. Before you were walking on sand.

Eventually we made our way to Main Street and up one of the side alleys to Back Street.

Nice old hot rod. I did not sit on it as requested.

Back Street was in pretty poor shape when we were here in 2018. It’s still not 100% but it’s a lot better than it was.

The Courthouse is looking pretty good now.

The souvenir shops are a bit cheaper on Back Street and the shopkeepers were friendly.

Shopping right next door to Ray’s Jewelry.

I didn’t go in though. I have enough watches at home to last a lifetime .

Back on Main Street we passed the little chapel we remembered from a previous visit.

The rain was picking up again so we hung out in the foyer of yet another souvenir shop until it slackened.

On our way back now. A good view of the cruise ships in port – Carnival. P&O, Marella, Celebrity.

Back aboard, this was the view from our balcony. Lots of maritime action.

Looks like the folks on the former Mercury are enjoying themselves.

Things brightened up in the afternoon, but we were happy to be back aboard. At least we did get to see a rainbow. Off to Tortola tomorrow.

Our 4th day on the cruise dawned warm and sunny with the calm seas we had become so used to. We were already on our way into Charlotte Amalie, St. Thomas.

This might be the place to mention a couple of crazy coincidences we experienced on the cruise.

I mentioned earlier that we were stuck with Celebrity Select Dining. Instead of changing to early Traditional Dining the first day, we decided to give it a try. On the second night we had to wait with a pager, then the wait staff took us down to the Traditional dining area anyway.

We were seated next to Tom and Debra. Weasked where they were from: “Ontario,Canada.”

So we told them we lived in Almonte. They knew where that was. Deb had lived in Ottawa for a while.

They told us they lived in a small town between Belleville and Kingston called Deseronto. I told them I grew up there. We knew a whole bunch of people in common. I went to high school with one of her best friends.

We tried to get the table next to Tom and Deb for the rest of the cruise but the Maitre d’ told us it was booked. However he was able to reserve another table for us in Traditional Early Dining.

When we eventually got to this table we met Catherine and Judd from York, SC. However Catherine was also born in Canada. Turns out she went to Queen’s University (so did we.) She even lived on Earl Street in Kingston – where Maria grew up. Crazy coincidences to be sure.

Back to St. Thomas. We were soon on our way into the town of Charlotte Amalie.

We docked at the Crown Bay Pier and since we were a 30 minute walk from Downtown and not in a particularly scenic area, we took a truck taxi downtown with 12 or so other cruisers.

Where we got off the taxi we soon met some of the local residents. No feral cats to be seen but St. Thomas does have feral chickens.

Lots of nice flowers around as well.

St. Thomas is a former Danish territory now owned by the USA. Dronningens Gade means Queen St. in Danish but nowadays it also goes by Main Street. St. Thomas is a shopping Mecca for the Americans because they get quite a nice duty free allowance if they buy stuff here. The main drag is crowded with watch and jewelry shops.

Another view of Dronningens Gade. That is about as much Danish as we saw here.

We remembered these cool alleyways off the Main Street which contained a variety of shops and restaurants. You won’t miss any souvenirs in St. Thomas. Won’t go hungry either.

This is one of the nicer side streets.

Nice little fountain at the other end of the Riise Mall.

Another pretty side street. I think we picked up our souvenirs near here.

It was getting hot and humid and we had our souvenirs, so we grabbed another taxi back to Crown Bay. The driver kindly took just the two of us – he didn’t try to get other passengers to share. On the way back he regaled us with stories of how expensive it was to live in St. Thomas. I guess tourism can be a mixed blessing for these folks.

Another coincidence – we were in port with an old friend. Adventure of the Seas was the ship we cruised on in 2022 when we visited the East Coast of the US and Canada. Nice to see her again.

Adventure of the Seas is about 20 years old now but she is looking great. Another classic cruise ship.

We were glad to be back on board as it was pretty warm and the port load in St. Thomas was about to increase by a fair amount.

Although the ship was docked in a rather industrial area the view from our side was pretty nice. So ended our port day in Charlotte Amalie, St. Thomas. See you tomorrow in Sint Maarten!

The second sea day on the cruise dawned with calm seas and warm temperatures.

As the day brightened up, things got warmer but the seas continued to be calm.

Lots of sun worshippers were enjoying themselves by the pool. Don’t forget the sunscreen!

This seemed like a good time to reflect on our cruise experience so far. Did we see any changes in the Celebrity vibe we were so familiar with? Well, yes…and no.

What hasn’t changed? Well, the level of service is still great. Jisrael our stateroom attendant was one of the best we have ever had on Celebrity – friendly, helpful, efficient. He kept our room immaculate.

The food was also excellent. Looking at the cruise as a whole, we got fine dining experiences everywhere – in the buffet, the Main Dining Room, the Captains’s Club breakfast room and the specialty restaurants.

The ship itself was as we remembered the Solstice Class – easy to find our way around and in very good condition. Having a balcony was a huge bonus. All our favorite haunts were still there – the library, the Hideaway, Cafe al Bacio.

The deck 5 entrance to the Ensemble Lounge and Specialty restaurants has that funky art which is characteristic of every Solstice Class ship.

I mean – that is real wood – isn’t it?

The main change we noticed was that the cruise line seemed to concentrate more on those passengers who were paying top dollar for suites and enhanced balcony rooms, while de-emphasizing the long time loyal cruise guests. There was no formal Captain’s Club Happy Hour locale every evening – they held it a couple of times in the Sky Lounge but they didn’t make a big deal of it. Also the Captain’s Club host seems to have disappeared. That job was lumped in with the person who looked after Concierge Class guests.

I’m happy we got a good deal and were able to sail in Concierge Class. Otherwise I think we would have felt underappreciated, even though we have pretty high status in the loyalty program.

Celebrity seems to be pushing its guests away from Traditional dining times and making them take Celebrity Select Dining as the primary option. Either that or they want you to start eating at a late hour. I suppose this is great for the Company as they manage their table service more efficiently. However if you are in Select Dining and you show up even 20 minutes after the dining room opens you are guaranteed another 20-30 minute wait. You’ll be loitering in the foyer with a pager till your table is available. This got old for us fast so we pulled rank with the Maitre d’ and got a Traditional dinner table part way through the cruise. Being Elite Plus does get their attention I guess.

Speaking of changes, we passed one of the newest Celebrity ships – the Beyond – as she made her way back to Fort Lauderdale. More about these new ships later on.

By our third day at day at sea the weather continued to be great,

As we got closer to San Juan the marine traffic picked up. We saw some fancy sea-going yachts.

We even saw some small Container ships that served mostly Caribbean ports.

Our stay in San Juan would be short and most of it would be after dark, but we were hopeful we’d see a bit of the old city. More on that coming up in the next post.

C stands for Caribbean. C also stands for Cruise. And recently – for the first time since 2018 – C stood for Celebrity.

In December 2023 we booked a February 2024 Eastern Caribbean cruise on Celebrity. It was partially to get away from winter and partially to cheer me up after the loss of our beloved cat Mr. Oates. We did not have any cat responsibilities so it was easier to get away for 10 days or so.

Our travel agent Crucon had a special sale where the upgraded Concierge Class stateroom was actually cheaper than a plain old balcony cabin. We had to book a sight unseen “Guarantee” room which was a little concerning. However Celebrity Captain’s Club loyalty program came to our rescue. We got a prime location on Deck 12 near the stern of the ship.

The ship we chose? It was the Celebrity Reflection – the last of the Solstice class ships and the only one we had not sailed on.

I’ll start documenting our cruise experiences soon – after we get back home and have decent photo storage and high speed bandwidth. Keep watching this space.