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| The Jewel of the Seas |
We boarded our Royal Caribbean cruise ship, the “Jewel of
the Seas,” and said farewell to San Juan for now (we’ll return for one night at
the end of our cruise). Internally, the Jewel of the Seas is a pretty ship with
great artwork, with a Thai theme we really like. And our stateroom is
well-located with respect to the elevators, theaters, the service & food
areas, and has a large porthole where we can see the sea and the condition of
the weather, so we are two happy cruisers!
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| Anne's new Larimar bracelet |
We got even happier the first night when we attended a port discussion
in the auditorium, offering tips for all the ports of call. We had arrived
late, so we missed getting raffle tickets, but two young girls seated near us
left early and handed us their tickets. The talk was not that stimulating, so
the audience kept diminishing as time went on. Finally, the discussion was over
and they held the raffle, and the first item was a Larimar bracelet. Now Anne
has had her eye on Larimar ever since we first saw the stone in the Dominican
Republic, so she was hoping to win. They
called a number, and no one came forward. They called a second number, and
still no one came forward. See how this is going? Then, they called Anne’s
number! She couldn’t believe her luck, and the blue stone bracelet is gorgeous.
We decided to stay for the rest of the drawing. Somewhere down the line Frank’s
number was called too. He had won 50% off a shore excursion for two (which we
quickly applied to our next day’s tour). This was a darn nice and valuable
prize, making our shore excursion even more desirable!
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| Sugar plantation house at Whim Estate |
St. Croix
Very heavy rain hampered our St. Croix shore excursion, but
we had our usual rain gear, so we were fine. Or as Frank likes to chide to
himself, “Suck it up, you fat old buttercup!
Get your rain gear on, and go see the sights.” Some of our fellow cruisers seemed stunned by
the rain and left the ship with little to protect them. Not a hat, umbrella, or
poncho – a few did use a beach towel draped over their heads!
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| Dry moat outside the basement of the plantation house |
Our shore excursion included three highlights of St. Croix.
The first stop was the Whim Estate, a former sugar plantation with several
restored buildings. The main house was extraordinarily airy with immense rooms,
high ceilings, and plenty of windows to catch the trade winds. The leaking
ceilings were indicative of a house that was in some disrepair, and Miss
Margaret the elderly guide was very happy to see us visitors. The basement was quite
unusual with a dry moat built around it to keep the cellar and the food stored in
it nice and cool.
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| Botanical Gardens |
Next stop was the Botanical Gardens which would have been
beautiful on a sunny day, but the deluge continued. Our guide Paul did nothing
to improve the situation. Rather than tell us about the garden, he was too busy
talking about his wife, his grandson, the fact that he speaks five languages.
You get the picture; he had nothing of informative value to impart.
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| The appropriately named Sausage Tree |
Anyway, we
did get some decent photos. One of the most interesting trees in the garden was the "sausage tree."
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| Our guide Jason at the Cruzan Rum Distillery |
Luckily, our last stop saved the day. Our bus driver Raschida
took us to the famous nearby Cruzan Rum Distillery. Our Cruzan Rum guide Jason
livened things up as he pretend enrolled our group of 17 in “Cruzan Rum
University,” teaching us everything from fermentation to distillation, and of
course, we celebrated our graduation with a generous tasting of the number one rum
in the world - Cruzan!
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| Anne with her new Pina Colada drinking buddy! |
Naturally, we had
Pina Coladas, some pineapple flavored rum, and some aged oak-flavored rum.
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| Jason hoists a final toast to his new graduates |
We were very surprised to learn that during the distillation
process, 70% is waste and is used as fertilizer. It is just thrown out into the fields for
recycling (Jason says they have a lot of happy cows on the island!), 20%
evaporates, and only 10% is usable for rum. All we can say is this 10% rum
makes one mean Pina Colada!
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| Dramatic scenery of St. Maarten |
St. Maarten/St. Martin
The island of St. Maarten is divided into two parts – the
southern part, which is under Dutch ownership, and the northern part which is
French. Our cruise ship docked in Philipsburg, the capital city of Dutch St.
Maarten, on the south side of the island.
We had a reservation to be escorted around the island by Bernard Tours,
a recommended tour group that Anne had researched for our time here on the
island.
Our driver Jackson, who affably liked
to be referred to as “Action Jackson,” was a 50-ish black dude who was a
well-spoken, and just a really fun guy. He kept us both entertained and
laughing throughout the tour, as he drove and divulged facts and figures about
the unique island. He skillfully wielded
his company’s 15-passenger van along the narrow highways of our route. The van
was relatively empty since our tour group was only made up of 5 people which
made for a cozy, intimate tour.
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| Simpson Bay on St. Maarten |
Action Jackson drove around the periphery of the island (a
distance of about 25 miles), stopping at scenic overlooks and places he thought
would be of interesting to us newcomers. We were surprised by the hilliness of
the terrain on this small island. The “hills” are not terribly high, the
tallest being only a little over 1800 feet, but the steep peaks are sharp and dramatic,
making the hills look even higher than they are.
The jungles of this island are very verdant. The French side
(north) gets the most rain, so it is by far the greenest. On the Dutch side, we
also saw limited jungle foliage, but there was also cactus at various
intervals. This island boasts of being the smallest land mass in the world shared
by two separate countries & nationalities of peoples. It has a grand total
of only 37 square miles (16 sq. miles for the Dutch side & 21 sq. miles for
the French).
The two sides have lots of reciprocal agreements and live in
harmony even though their official languages, currencies, and laws are
different. For example, the drinking age is 18 on the French side but only 16
on the Dutch side!
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| Calvin shows Anne how to handle a sea urchin |
We made several stops for photo ops and for some unusual
wildlife. At one stop, Calvin the Sea Urchin Man showed us various sea urchins,
conch, starfish, et al. And even let us
hold the strange-feeling creatures.
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| Miniature Jurassic park! |
We also visited the Iguana Man – a roadside stand where a
vendor had a bevy of 30 pet iguanas roaming around on a flat makeshift
blanketed area. The happy-go-lucky vendor chuckled heartily when Anne jumped
out of our tour van and belted out, “Looks like Jurassic Park!”
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| Anne feeds the hungry iguanas |
Of course, with that, the vendor gave Anne the
charge of feeding them with a large leaf of their favorite food. Several hungry
iguanas charged Anne for the food and scared her so much by the sudden surge that
she dropped the iguana food and jumped backwards in white-knuckled fear! We all had a good laugh as we tried to take
advantage of this unexpected photo op.
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| Anne loves her French croissant! |
Action Jackson took us up to the French side of the island (St.
Martin) where we stopped in the city’s capital of Marigot to do some shopping,
get acquainted with the locals, and have some lunch. (Anne was thrilled with
her real French croissant!)
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| Maho Beach |
And finally, we went to the famous Maho Beach, aka “Airplane
Beach”, where the planes from the airport across the street fly so close to the
beach and bathers that sometimes they appear to be within arm’s reach of the
swimmers in the water. The bigger and heaver the aircraft, the closer to the
water the planes drop for their landing.
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| Famous "Airplane Beach!" |
Unfortunately, only lighter aircraft passed over the waters on the day we
were there. We really enjoyed our day on
this scenic and friendly island and look forward to coming back next summer!
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