2013 Adventures, Boarded the Cruise Ship!

dgbg100106

Missing the Tag Fiary
Joined
Mar 24, 2008
Hello everyone…… :wave2:

Again, another year without a Disney vacation but this one should be lots of fun either way. We have two cruises planned, so I think I will start with the cruise coming up in Feb… Time for us to get away from all of this cold weather in Maryland and cruise down into some warm weather, in the Caribbean.

This started four years ago, on a whim we decided to take a cruise in Feb to the Caribbean on board the Celebrity Mercury. That year 2010, the day before we left, we had planned to get a massage and pedicure before the cruise to prep. While we were out and about, a snow storm started, weatherman said no big deal, be gone before long… So we head out to relax, and 3 hours later and 9 inches of powder later, we are heading back home to pack…

The port is only 20 minutes from our house, but we were not sure of the weather conditions, for the next day but we were going on this cruise and heading to warm weather. By the time, we had washed clothes and packed, everything we would need the snow had stopped and the sun was out, the temp was rising. Big sigh of relief here.

The next morning David is driving to the port, me in passenger seat and son in back seat (he was taking the car back home), in the line to drop passengers off, we get rear ended by a limo…. Ughh, this is not going as planned. I let David handle it, turns out that it was not bad at all; we exchanged info and went our way.

A couple of days into the cruise the staff announce that a major snow storm has hit the Baltimore/DC area, I send an email home to our son to see how life back home is? Power is out, and we have 2 feet of snow. Not really bad yet, but not good either. A day or two later we hear more snow has dumped and closed DC? So we call back home. Four feet of snow, power out and Baltimore and DC are closed. We are 88 degrees in St. Thomas. Right then and there, David and I planned to be away every February to somewhere warm. Our son sent a picture of the snow and we sent him a picture of the beach.

So, this is our yearly trek to someplace warm.
 
Here is the cruise itinerary

I hope to add more here as I know it....

Day 1 Baltimore, Maryland

Day 2 Cruising
I Believe this will be our first formal night.​

Day 3 Cruising

Day 4 Cruising

Day 5 Tortola, British Virgin Islands


Day 6 St. John's, Antigua

Day 7 Philipsburg, St. Maarten

While we are here we are planning on heading to the beach and watching the planes land.​

Day 8 Charlotte Amalie, St. Thomas

Every year we go back to this great little bar, that sits in an alleyway and drink Bushwaker's, the official drink of St. Thomas, we tend to buy a lot of liquor here too, to bring back.​

Day 9 San Juan, Puerto Rico

Here I am planning on eating some mufango and drinking a Pina Colada​

David also saw on Man Vs. Food and Triple D, a food truck in San Juan, that he wants to visit while we are there.​

I am guessing this will be our Second Formal Night?​

Day 10 Labadee, Haiti

Day 11 Cruising
This should be our third and final Formal Night!!!!​

Day 12 Cruising

Day 13 Baltimore, Maryland
 


Sounds great. I would love to see those planes come in over that beach. Looking forward to more. I have it bookmarked!
 


Can't wait to read all about it!

I am researching a possible 3 night cruise out of Tampa or Port Canaveral with JUST DH next year. (Dropping the kids off with the grandparents outside of Tampa ;))

I can't get enough of the blogs and trip reports on Cruise Critic so I am very excited for this!:thumbsup2
 
Looks like a great itinerary.

Can't wait to read all about it!

I am researching a possible 3 night cruise out of Tampa or Port Canaveral with JUST DH next year. (Dropping the kids off with the grandparents outside of Tampa ;))

I can't get enough of the blogs and trip reports on Cruise Critic so I am very excited for this!:thumbsup2

Thanks for coming along...

Please ask anything I have been on 13 different cruises, so I might forget to post something but please ask away.
 
We started out with an inside cabin on deck 5, we put the deposit down on it while we were still on board our last February cruise. About 3 years ago, I gave up on the suites/balcony cabins, which we had done exclusively, for an inside, with just the two of us, it plenty of room and we got to cruise an extra time during the year with the money we saved by moving to an inside cabin.

Somewhere around the November or December timeframe, right before the final payment was due; the price on the Guaranteed Cabins dropped by $300 or $150 each person. So we decided to move to a guarantee cabin, I had never done this before and I was kind of scared about changing from a known to an unknown. When we were assigned our cabin, I read the general description about it on the website and I was a little upset. I called my travel agent and he told me that it was actually a better cabin than I had before, that it was considered an upgrade, so we left it and I will have to report after if it was worth it.

So for $300 we changed our cabin to an unknown cabin and we are hoping for the best!
 
Here is the Enchantment of the Seas.

EN_01.jpg
 
We were on the Enchantment last year and in December of 2012 the Enchantment underwent a renovation.

According to RCL the new enhancements are :

All exterior staterooms were refurbed, New curtains, chairs, coffee table. A total refurb on the bathroom. Fiberglass flooring.

Interior staterooms only got new Flat Screen TV's

The new staterooms on Deck 7, 8 are behind a paneled wall.

The Big Screen TV out by the pool area is new also

New Carpet throughout the ship and the dance area in the main lobby has been enlarged
 
She looks fantastic. I have never got a balcony, had OV once. For our Hawaii we have an inside and saved so much money. It is plenty of room and we only sleep in there anyway. I don't think you will be disappointed with a guarantee.
 
Thanks for coming along...

Please ask anything I have been on 13 different cruises, so I might forget to post something but please ask away.

I'm sure I will be asking you a ton of questions!

I am still undecided about what to do as our "get away". Our tradition is to do UO/IOA for a couple of nights. They were offering a really awesome military discount this year! If they offer it again in 2014 we may stick with that.

A cruise is just so much better for us budget wise! I have a year to decide...But I am an obsessive planner so I keep researching anyway. :)
 
I think cruises are the way to go. Just about everything is covered. Meals, sleeping, pool and good old relaxing.
 
Sounds amazing!!
I have never ever been on a cruise before so I will be living vicariously thru you :lmao:
We go to WDW 3 or 4 times a year (6hr drive), but we let our AP's expire on our last trip back in August and have nothing planned for this year. :guilty:
 
I'm in! Can you take lots of pics on the ship? Like the public areas and dining room? We're looking at doing more cruising. I haven't seen many pictures of ships other than Disney.
 
I'm here. The itinerary looks great! Wow on missing that giant storm in 2010, what magnificent luck.
 

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