Eastern Caribbean Cruise

I’ve enjoyed quite a few multi-city/country-hopping trips, over the years.  But between figuring out how long to stay in each place and trying to get the transportation and accommodation to line up accordingly (and on budget), there’s a lot of work to be done!  Not to mention, you never fully get to unpack and relax, since you’re on to the next place after a few days.  So, wouldn’t it be amazing if you could just find one nice hotel that’s accessible, has all sorts of amenities, and then have it magically take you to different places?  Well, those hotels actually DO exist – they’re called cruise ships (just in case the title of this page wasn’t enough of a spoiler ;)!  And, so far, my only foray into ‘cruising’ was a 7-day, Eastern Caribbean trip aboard Royal Caribbean’s Liberty of the Seas.

For those of you unfamiliar with cruises, these behemoth ships are like floating resort hotels.  This particular ship was 14 storeys high and had several restaurants, bars/lounges, a dance club, shops, a casino, pools, a track around the top of the ship, a surf simulator pool, a rock climbing wall, a full gym with a boxing ring, a theatre for live entertainment, and an ice skating rink (yes, you read that correctly)!!  And it appears as though they’ve added a splash pad and water slides to it, since I took my trip in 2009!

There are a few similarities, between cruises and all-inclusive resorts:  You have a buffet and main dining hall for all of your meals, you can plan off-ship excursions at the ports of call, and have access to most of the amenities, activities & entertainment.  But unlike the majority of all-inclusive resorts, not everything is covered on a cruise!  It may differ, depending on your cruise line, but in most cases, you will have to buy drink packages (pop or wine) and there are also a few a la carte restaurants on the ship that aren’t included either.  You’ll also have different check-out (disembarking) times and may need to put aside a bit of extra money for the end of the trip, so you can leave tips in envelopes for the various staff members that looked after your room and food service.

Where I went/what I saw:

The cruise that I went on (for my buddy’s wedding) started and ended in Miami – with three stops along the way:

San Juan, Puerto Rico –  I spent most of the day at the citadel/fort Castillo de San Cristóbal, for the wedding, but what a place to be!  It’s apparently the largest Spanish fort ever built and is a national historic site.  I also had the chance to dine with friends and wander the streets in Old San Juan – stopping to grab a photo op at the statue of Christopher Columbus.

As you can imagine, accessibility in the citadel and old section of the city wasn’t the greatest, but it was still manageable.  I also ate on the street/patio, with my friends, so there wasn’t much of an issue there.

Philipsburg, St. Maarten – Though it appears to be a quaint little town with a lovely beach,  it’s actually the capital of St. Maarten – located on the Dutch side of the island – and is supposed to be a good place to go if you’re looking to buy or upgrade a diamond, since prices are wholesale.  But I didn’t bring that kind of scratch with me and was already happy with the zero diamonds that I had, so I instead opted to stroll through town for a bit and then park myself on a rented beach chair, with a $1  bottle of Heineken (or at least it was, back in 2009! 🙂  There were several beach activities available, with numerous shops and casinos nearby, and with it being an all-day stop, you could also hop a cab and explore the rest of the island, like the French side or Maho Beach, where one of the airport’s runways is so close to the beach that planes come REALLY close to landing on it – making for a great photo op (and also sending thrill seekers hurdling backwards into the water).

There weren’t any issues getting around, from what I remember.  The streets and boardwalk were relatively flat and easy to navigate, and I’m pretty sure there were public washrooms (with sufficient accessibility) along the beach.  It did rain briefly, when I was wandering around initially, but with it being such a small island, the clouds pass over quickly and it only lasted about 10 mins.

“Labadee”, Haiti – The name is in quotations because it’s not a town or place that you can find on the map – it’s actually a small piece of land (mostly beach) that’s owned by Royal Caribbean.  The ship tenders really close to the island (i.e. it anchors close by and you take a smaller boat to reach the shore), so it’s not a long trip on the boat.  The problem for anybody using a mobility device is that the sand is quite deep, for the most part, so getting around can be a challenge.  There were these ‘beach wheelchairs’ that had gigantic inflated tires, which allow you to glide on top of the sand, rather than sinking in.  But the problem was that you had to be pushed by somebody and would have no chance of getting inside a washroom (even though they had accessible stalls), or into the picnic table/barbecue area, where they served lunch (if you’re not ambulatory).  You would also have trouble accessing the enclosed artist’s village area, where they allowed local artists to peddle their wares.  But in all honesty, that might be a good thing, as it was a bit heart-breaking to see these destitute Haitians clamouring and almost begging tourists to check out their collections – hoping that they’ll buy something (some even asked for food from the catered barbecue lunch).  And each artist had a wrangler too, so as you were apologizing to one for not buying anything – feeling as though you’d just shot their family pet – you were being pulled by another wrangler to the next display.

There were other beach-related activities there too, including a zip line, but I was already having enough “fun” trying to get from A to B (in the sand) that I didn’t get to check everything out.

Cruise ship gallery: