6 days, 5 cities. We travel on. The seas have been mild with the exception of a few days where there were slight waves. In an abundance of caution the cruise director or Capitan will come on and ask us to hold the handrails, but more often than not it’s been smooth sailing.
Our first port of call was in Kingstown, St. Vincent. This is another small island in the lesser Antilles. It is around 100 miles west of Barbados. It is an island that has an active volcano and is in the hurricane belt. Those poor people. The other thing to note…it’s mountainous. There doesn’t seem to be any flat land there at all.
This island we were told, required passengers to be a part of a tour or they couldn’t get off. I Was unable to find us any diving on such short notice so we opted for a Kayak and Snorkel tour. I have to say, I hated it! No one told us we would have to ride a van through the narrow crowded streets of Kingstown. No one told us the road went half way up a mountain before coming back down again. It was terrible for me.
When we got to the bottom there was finally a place to pull over and park the van we were all in. This was a dicy ride up until this point. I would be lying if I didn’t tell you I had my head buried in some strangers lap the entire ride. Thankfully he and his wife were good sports. We all laughed at my fear when we finally got out of the van. She even came up with some absurd breathing technique to try and calm my mind. 9 breaths in, hold for 2 out for 7 hold for 3 or some such nonsense. She told me 3 days later it was all made up. It worked. Between that and taking off the mask the hyperventilating stopped.
We walked to the shore and got a lesson on how to enter and paddle the kayaks. Since we have done this before on numerous occasions, George said lets go for the glass bottom one. Big Mistake! It was like paddling in a milk carton. Sure it was cool to see the sea life under the boat, but that only lasted near the shore. The rest of the time it was just a horrible vehicle to ride in.
The first thing we did was go through a cave. This was super fun. Pull in the paddles and use your hands to get through. I saw many crabs and heard the bats. We saw no evidence of them and thankfully were not crapped on. At the end of the cave was a stalactite in the form of a uvula. Here we had to duck rather low to be able to get out. Once outside, we found ourselves a place to hold up and took photos of the other kayakers coming out of the cave.
From here we were to paddle to the shore for some snorkeling. We ran into rain though. Our dry clothes were now completely soaked through. Oh well. We got ashore and since the rain had stopped, we placed them on some tall grass in the sun hoping they would dry out.
We jumped in the water and went for a look-around. It was fun. Honestly. There were more sea urchins than I have ever seen before. And they were massive. George couldn’t help but mention how much he enjoys uni and wished he could have had some. We went out as far as we were allowed and slowly returned to shore. I managed to take a video of an eel. I watched it move into the rocky area and stick its head up. I stayed on the surface. I felt it best even though it was just a baby.
From there we had to paddle back, but first, we got our even more wet clothes and put them into the bag. While we were under the water, it rained some more. It was best that we just stay in our swim bottoms with a dry t-shirt on the top. On the paddle back George and I didn’t wait for anyone. We just left hoping that we wouldn’t take an hour to get there. Sure enough, all the proper kayaks passed us and made it to shore a good 10-15 minutes before we did.
When we got to shore we asked the guide what she thought of those boats. Her answer is not repeatable on a child friendly site. We completely agreed. But on the positive side, we got a real workout in.
Back into the van for the return trip. Oh joy! I couldn’t wait. This time George sat next to me. But first, a stop to try the local rum punch. 84.5% is what that was. Upon drinking though, it was more punch than rum. We also opted to have a beer. That my friends helped get me back down the mountain. Of course having George next to me holding my hand and calming me didn’t hurt any.
When we returned to the ship, we decided to bring the gear out on the balcony to dry off before going up for lunch. What a mess! It was a real disaster. There was sand and leaves and bark all over the room and the balcony. I felt sorry for our room steward, but he very kindly came in and cleaned it all up.
The rest of the day we just lazed around. I for one was exhausted from all that paddling.
The next two days found us in Barbados. For these two days I had prearranged some scuba diving for us. We didn’t have to meet our driver until 1:15 so we had a lazy morning followed by an early lunch of a hamburger. Big mistake! But that’s just me.
We walked out to the traffic circle only to be told to go back inside and wait. 20 minutes after the appointed time I got a call from the owner of the dive shop telling me to get a cab and go to his place. We grabbed one and away we went.
Once we arrived, we discussed how much weight we needed and payment. Then I realized I had forgotten our skins. We had to use theirs. Yuck. Half suits. I knew we would be getting cold. And I was right.
We jumped on the boat with another young couple who were getting certified. George and I had both a dive master (in training) and a rescue diver with us. This was service!
We took off for a very calm lagoon area and set anchor. Upon getting the briefing we all dove into the water and took off. I believe we went through 4 ship wrecks that day with another couple we could have seen. This was amazing. There were so many fish there and the coral was wonderful. We even fed some turtles and grouper. On the way out of one of the wrecks, George hit some fire coral. Thankfully the burn didn't last too long and the next day he was fine.
In one of the ships there was an air pocket that we went up to, took off our masks and had a chat. How strange that feeling. We were still 50 feet under water. We completely enjoyed the day. It was a bit shorter than our normal dives, lasting only 50 minutes. As usual, one dive was enough for us.
Again we left our gear at the dive shop, but this time we had no funny feelings about it. The next morning we were picked up at 8:15 am and headed out to the boat. When we arrived, there was the couple that were certifying the day before and another couple and a single gentleman. We all got our gear and were headed towards the boat.
Today was a bit different. The waves were bigger than the day before and there were even a few times that the boat skipped along the water. When we finally got to where we were going, there was Sandals boat on the anchor so we had to wait. It felt like forever because of the waves. One of the girls doing the certification dive got sea sick and I was ready to heave myself. This was insane.
Eventually the other boat left and we anchored. When we did so, the new divers jumped in first to ease their tummies. George and I were next and went straight to the bottom. There was no waiting at the top for the guide this time. They advised us to go down as fast as we could to get out of the waves. No problem with that. We dove.
Sadly, the bottom was no better than the surface. We were in a drift dive and were given no choice in that. Oh well. We headed out towards another ship wreck, and while I am sure it was enjoyable to see, I did not have a good time. In fact, I would go so far as to say I hated it. It was the most unpleasant dive we have done yet. I burned through 1/2 a tank of air before 15 minutes were up. Not because of bad breathing-although I guess it was-but because I was working so hard just to go forward. I felt as though I would take one lunge forward and three back. God knows how it happened, but we managed to stay down for 43 minutes.
One of the guys with us-a new diver, this was only his second-had a bad regulator. He told the dive master about it on the boat but they told him it would fix itself when he got under the water. It didn’t as you can see by the buddy breathing here.
We were told to do a decompression stop holding on to the anchor rope so we didn’t drift off. What a cluster f**k. Everyone was on top of each other to keep within the range needed for our computers. In the end, I grabbed George’s BCD and floated free of the pack. Poor him, he held on for the time needed-5 minutes because of the mess we were in.
When we finally got back to the boat, I tossed my fins up and was looking for help climbing the ladder. None came. To make matters worse, the ladder was free floating (of course) but kept pushing up against me so I had a horrible time getting on it. I finally got help on the very last wrung of the ladder and that was only because I refused to move until someone grabbed my tank. I just had no strength left to pull it up. George was right behind me and they kept shouting at him to stay behind. He wasn’t having it because he had the same problems I did.
Normally we would have been stuck on the boat for the second dive, but George and I and the other new couple of divers said one only and take us back out of here. They obliged and we paid up. That in itself was a bit of an ordeal as they wanted us to each pay for 4 tanks when we had only used 2. As for the man with the broken regulator-they didn’t charge him for his equipment rental. They are lucky he paid for any of the trip at all. I wouldn’t have. But then, I would have refused to enter the water with faulty equipment. The moral of this story: Don’t dive with anyone else equipment!
The first day with this company was wonderful. The second. No way! But George is right. We have now had the worst possible dive we could have so the rest from here can only get better. We returned to the "bubble" that we were in and bought 3 different local beers to try in the afternoon. We returned to the ship and took a well deserved nap. I don’t remember much else after that.
In St. Lucia we were in yet another one of those "bubble" stops. This time we chose to do a snorkel and catamaran tour. We headed out at the appointed hour and truly enjoyed the day. The highlight of it was when George went free diving amongst a group of new scuba divers. I don’t think he saw them when he initially submerged and by the time he got down, it was a bit late. They seemed unaware of him so all was good.
It was ok as far as the underwater sights were concerned. Meh is the word that comes to mind. But, there were two highlights. We saw a trumpet fish actually trumpet! The mouth must open to around 5 times the diameter of the body. And we saw the sea cucumber feeding tentacles. They look to be long white strings. A final bonus is that I realized while snorkeling I really don’t need the red filter on the camera lens.
It was quite funny. On the ride back, it began to rain for a while and all of us went running under cover. It wasn’t like we were just in the water or anything now was it? They served plenty of rum punch onboard and after about 1/2 an hour there was a Congo line that had formed. George and I went out to the front and sat on the netting enjoying the semi-quiet-at least we got away from the over loud speakers.
When we returned, we went into the shopping area and purchased some SPF 40 swim shirts for ourselves. We realized that if we are going to be swimming or snorkeling we should cover up a bit. After we made our purchases, we returned to the ship where we lay out relaxing for a bit before heading up to dinner with some friends in the Polo Grill. As always, the company was wonderful.
Next up: St. John’s Antigua. Here we had a morning scoot. We were finally free to explore ashore on our own again! George and I headed out at around 10 am on a mission. Find the old church and a local liqueur. We succeeded at one but not the other.
The church was around 6 blocks from the pier and easy to get to on the scooters. The one thing I will say though is we did not enjoy the scoot as much as we usually do. There were all too many vehicles on the roads and only 7 stoplights on the entire island (we discovered this later on the tour). I took my photos and we made a few stops at grocery/liquor stores but came up empty on the liqueur. I couldn’t help but feel we were in a very poor spot when I went inside those stores. I’m not at all sure how much things cost, but the vegetables had all seen better days, and the shelves were bare. What I did notice plenty of was beans and pastas. This is usually the sign of a less than ideal diet brought on by lack of income. (Am I being too biased in my observations?)
We returned to the ship where I packed up our snorkeling gear and a cookie for after the dip in the water. At 12:10 we were on the pier with 10 others from the ship and off we went to swim with the STING RAYS! I was a bit nervous about this initially, but then realize you only live once so why not.
When we arrived at the location, we were given a briefing about the rays and how to touch them. They told us not to use fins, or to use our booties as we didn’t want to hurt the animals. We all grabbed our gear and headed out for the boat. It was a flat bottom thing with about 6 seats that would hold around 4 people each. There was no comfort to this one and it was a bone jarring ride out to a pontoon made of what looked like large plastic cooking oil jugs-they were in fact purpose built floats. Here we all stripped of our outer clothes and donned snorkels and headed into the water with the rays.
Oh my! What an experience! When I first got into the water a ray bumped me and jolted me a bit. I was shocked more than anything. We then headed off to the side where George guided me by my feet and I took video of the rays. After a while we went over and held one for photographs followed by a walk in the other direction to take some more photos. After a short while one of the guides brought out a bucket of squid and boy did the rays make a beeline for him. We all went over and gave feeding them a go. I initially said no, but when George went back and did it again, I gave it a try. What a strange feeling to have them suck the squid out of your hands. We decided when it turned into a feeding frenzy to back away. Time for us to head back to the boat and get into dry clothes.
When everyone was done with the rays we took the boat back to shore. Here we were treated with rum punch and George ate a few of his cookies (a must to heat you up after the cold of the water-although I do like this Caribbean rum punch thing.)
The ride back was filled with laughter. The people we were riding with were an absolute hoot. My sides ached. The funniest thing to me was the conversations around Velveta, Spam, and canned cheese. And here I am complaining about not enough caviar.
Today while in port there were a few other ships. One was the Mein Schiff 2 from Germany with around 2600 passengers, another was the Norwegian Dawn which holds 2340 passengers, and the third was the HMS Medway. The German ship was massive. I’ve seen the TUI ships before and don’t think I’d like to be on one-just too many people. The HMS Medway was having some sort of a reception in the afternoon as we were getting ready to leave the port.
Funny thing about that one. There were 2 armed guards walking the deck the entire time it was in port. Comforting and yet not. I mean who wants to be next to a ship that feels the need for armed guards. The other was that there was no news broadcasting until we left port. They had sent out blockers. I guess they didn’t want the sailors to know what was going on in the world around them.
The local art was fun.
Dinner: Caviar! Not much, but there was a dollop on a puff that was rather lovely. I also had the shrimp cocktail, but I shan’t complain about the poop shoot that was left inside one piece. But the absolute best thing about dinner that evening was the potion size. I asked only for a bit of mashed potato and some peas. They have served this to me quite a few times now. Tonight was different though. I was served it in a pasta dish. A mound of mashed potatoes in the middle and a nice vibrant ring of green peas and blanched onions (?!?) around the outside. When asked about it I couldn’t help but tell the waiter there was enough there to feed 4 people. I always ask for a small portion because I don’t eat a lot to begin with, and since gaining a few pounds, I’ve decided I need more portion control. Sadly, 3/4 of it was sent back at the end of the meal. But it did taste good and filled the belly.
Finally, Roseau, Dominica. Unlike many of our fellow passengers, I haven’t been to all of the Caribbean. Each new island is an adventure to me that I look forward to. Dominica was no different. And yet it was. This island I wouldn’t mind returning to on holiday. Yes, the port area is over crowded with many ramshackle buildings, but I could tell from the one excursion we too, and our subsequent short hike that there are amazing hiking trails on this island. In fairness, the guide told us the last hurricane hit in 2017 and every 40 years or so they get a category 5 hurricane and everything is wiped out. I fully understand the make-do buildings around the island. I would become too depressed if I had to live like that and would have long ago left.
Today we went to the emerald pool and river tubing. It was a fun excursion. I enjoyed the beauty of the pool area. Some of the others took a dip, but at 76 degree air temperature I didn’t want to freeze my bits. Someone shouted that it was a fertility pool, but I think it probably has just the opposite effect on people.
After a while George and I decided to head back to the vans. We came to a fork in the road and convinced security that we could hike a wet trail. So off we went. The first stop we came to was a beautiful observation lookout. We stayed for a few moments enjoying the solitude and wonder of the spot. We hiked on to the next lookout that this time overlooked the Atlantic Ocean. After a few minutes we began to hear the van horns telling all of the guests to head back to the vehicles.
Upon our return we boarded the bus and headed for the river tubing. As we were pulling up to the area, George commented that the river was too rough for inner tubes. But as it turned out, that was exactly where we were headed.
We all got a briefing and then were given inner tubes and sent on our way. Ok. My name is Roxanne. I get that. It’s not ROCKSanne. But hahaha did we get a good laugh out of me being stuck on any damned rock that was sticking up in that river. I was a magnet to them. We were told we are in the dry season and that they only get around 60 inches of rain a year in this area. The other parts of the island get upwards of 300 inches a year!
The rapids were fun and I giggled a lot when I finally managed to go over them. The good part about being stuck? I got to chat with the guides. The sides of the mountains were dug out purposefully to make the roads, and the channels we were rafting through were built by the guides. They said it took about a day to put together and they could use them for a week or so until the rain came again and filled the river which washed the rocks away. What enterprising young men. At the end we had the obligatory rum punch and surprise, surprise, there were proper changing rooms!
We boarded the bus and returned to the dock. Here George and I ran into the local duty free shop to purchase a local drink and some chocolate covered ginger. Don’t be tempted by it! Trust me on this one.
We ate lunch then headed to the room for George’s afternoon respite. I wrote on this for a while before heading to the shore to visit the Dominica Museum. No such luck. By 3 pm they were already closed. There were a few small tourist shops open, but that was all there was for me to go see. I returned to the ship to await the sail away.
Which brings me to Oceania itself. There is a severe problem with lack of communication here. Some passengers have been getting daily updates on the itinerary changes and changes to COVID testing as well. And then there are some of us who don’t get any at all. (Unless of course you count the 3 emails a day asking us to take another cruise.) My tour guide has received nothing from Oceania since we left Miami. It is a real shame that they don’t inform the passengers on the ship itself what is going on. I received an email from a fellow passenger today telling us we need to fill in some forms for part of the voyage later on. Had it not been for her, I wouldn’t have it. I don’t think my TA should have to call Oceania every week asking what is happening. This whole business of letting half of the people know what is happening is what starts bad rumors. Shame on them. I hope it’s not this way for the 2024 ATW. Although to be honest, I really don’t expect much based on our experience with this cruise.
All aboard tonight is 5:30. As I sat on the balcony, I watched the gangplank being pulled up beginning just before 5 pm. This captain doesn’t stop to mow any lawns. I like it. I told my lover today if I’m not 10 minutes early, I’m late. I believe the captain feels the same. I can’t imagine that that extra 1/2 hour saves that much in port fees.
Watching the Dominica crew work to release our boat was a hoot. There is one cute little pilot boat that reminded me of a child’s toy. This boat took men to the 5 offshore tie downs and they in turn released the ropes holding the ship in place. At 5:48 the ships horn blew three times and we were on our way. The little pilot boat went back out and picked up each of the men sitting on a platform.
As we left the island mother nature came out to bid us ado with a beautiful rainbow.
Tomorrow is St. Kitts and a round of golf followed by a whole lot more diving. Forgive me for such a long time between posts, but we are super active and when we return to the ship, exhaustion sets in. Our next sea day is on the 14th so I’m sure that is the day I will post again. I want to enjoy these stops as long as I can.
For all our puzzle friends I’m so sorry. I wouldn’t buy the 9 blocks of Disney puzzle. It just isn’t our thing. Maybe on one of the next islands. Until next time, Happy Puzzling and Smooth Sailing.
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