Once again we were drawn to the Caribbean. We hit three new spots and returned to Grand Turk. We love to do the snorkeling there.
It's a little nerve wracking to plan a cruise to the Caribbean during what is still considered Hurricane season. Actually, though we traveled to Aruba and Curacao which are considered to be too far south for the big storms. About a week before we left Florence made landfall in North Carolina. There was also Helene on its heels. But, she turned north up the Atlantic. And also Isaac which sorta petered out in the Lesser Antilles.
I kept checking the weather forecast before the trip and It looked like we would be fine except it might be windy in Aruba. During the voyage the on board app would occasionally show that we would probably get rain during the later part of the trip. But, it all turned out great. Our first sea day was a little windy and our second was little hazy. But, there was plenty of sun and only one slight sprinkling of rain the whole week.
Our first port of call was Princess Cays in the Bahamas. I hadn't ever noticed this port on the Carnival circuit until after the 2017 hurricane season when it seemed it began taking some of the load off Half Moon Cay. It is quite close and very similar. The water temperature the whole week was a couple of degrees better than I was expecting, usually in the 86-88 degree range, very nice. Snorkeling at Princess Cays was fun and not taxing or dangerous. We enjoyed our spot even though we understand now we could have had more seclusion to the south side of the tender port.
Here is Steve modeling his new full face snorkel mask. I tried it out and like it a lot. Might have to get one.
This group of fish was swimming just off the lifeguard pier, probably waiting for food to be thrown to them.
We did the Chukka tours Ultimate snorkeling adventure in Grand Turk. The neatest feature is the wall where you can practice diving deep. Unfortunately, they make you wear the silly emergency inflate vests. And, I swear there is some residual air in them which makes it that much harder to dive. My little underwater camera is great and all. But, we sometimes have trouble figuring out how to get it in the proper mode. It defaults to video and I think it's probably best to shoot stills. Plus, you really can't see the screen underwater so you are flying blind the whole time. I "took" tons of pictures in Grand Turk when the camera really wasn't powered on. All we ended up with was a bunch of inadvertent video shots, from which I was able to scavenge a couple of screen shots.
Snapper fish in Grand Turk.
This port was also greatly damaged by the storms of 2017. In rebuilding they added to the Las Vegas atmosphere of most of the resort area. It's best to go south of the Carnival pier for more privacy.
I don't really have too much trouble getting down to about 30'. But, it would be nice to be rid of the vest and have free diving fins to try to go further.
The first sea day during almost all of the daylight hours we had a large group of Boobies accompanying us on the port side only. It was quite entertaining to watch them glide and then dive for fish, leaving a turquoise trail in the water. They were attended by a couple of large Frigate birds who almost never flapped their wings. It may have been the effect of the wind across our bow that kept them with us and only on the one side. The rest of the week we saw very few seabirds.
Curacao was fun. The ship was in port from 8:30am to 10:30pm. We hired a bus tour that took us around the island for a couple of hours pointing out the sights and teaching us the history and the culture. After that tour, they dropped us off at a lovely beach (Mambo beach) that was crowded with TOO MANY people. We eventually made the best of it and quite enjoyed ourselves.
Part of our group was an extended family. They had left some of their kids on the ship. One young woman was trying to figure out how she could get back to the boat and bring her son to Mambo beach because she knew he would love it. She changed her plans around some and then came back to the ship the same time we did so she could retrieve him and take him back. Later the next day we made a wrong turn down a corridor on our deck and ran into her. So, we were able to ask her how it all went and if her son enjoyed it. Then after we got straightened out we also ran into a young black couple we had chatted with while boarding the cruise. In retrospect it seems we were supposed to make that wrong turn and run into them. We never did see them again.
We were scheduled to leave Aruba at 3:30 so we debarked early and hired another bus to take us to a beach. After the experience at Mambo beach we were careful to explain what we were looking for. Snorkeling was important. But, relatively small crowds were more important. Even at that while the driver was taking us probably to Arashi beach we discussed further. He directed us to Boca Catalina beach which is just south of Catalina Cove where he actually dropped us off. The only drawback was any facilities were a 5 minute walk up the beach. But, they were not needed. This spot was perfect and may be my new vision of paradise.
This is a place where a lot of the snorkeling excursions bring their patrons. But, they didn't come to the beach. The water was perfect. The sun was only occasionally obscured by small thin clouds until about the time we were leaving. We had about 4 hours there. We parked our towels under a Jacaranda tree in front of a couple of private residences. We shared the space with some birds and small lizards. Shell hunting was very good here. We evens saw a couple of chitons which I haven't seen in forever. When I wasn't in the water, I was lying on the sand at the waterline letting the waves lap at me. Afterward I would have to go rinse the sand from my shorts.
Angelfish in Aruba.
California Lighthouse.
Pretty sure that was a Royal Caribbean boat.
We hadn't planned on doing much in Fort Lauderdale when we returned other than get an uber or someone to take us to Church. As I thought about it we felt it would be best to have a taxi take us to the airport where we could rent a car. Our flight wasn't leaving until 6:30. So, we had some time to use. There was an English speaking ward meeting at 1pm. But, once we got the car we drove to the chapel to see what we would find. We met some very nice people including Brother Terron from the High Council. He said the Spanish ward was meeting at 11am and also that his ward was having a linger longer at noon. He persistently encouraged us to go to the Spanish Sacrament meeting so we could then attend the lunch at noon. Well, we hadn't quite had our fill of food yet. So, that's what we did.
We met a senior missionary couple, the Gunns. Turns out he is the brother of Roger Gunn who was in the mission with me and Michelle. Also met some nice Elder and Sister missionaries and participated in a birthday celebration for one of the eight year olds. The Elders showed us the park next door.
The chapel in Fort Lauderdale is on very nice grounds. We thought the mossy Oak trees were especially fun.
Adjacent to the chapel is a park that abuts the South Fork of the New River.
We then drove out to see their Temple. Although we couldn't get very close. It is very lovely.
A couple of notes and observations: We booked our rooms at the same time as the Youngs and right next to each other. We thought it would be simple to arrange to dine at the same table and time. Not so. We could have arranged it at 8:15. But, that's too late. So Lenore and I got to know some strangers and so did the Youngs.
Lenore and I shared a table with Tammy and Joe Leal. He is a personal injury attorney who lives in Phoenix and she is a nurse and runs a labor and delivery clinic in the Seattle area. And yes they live apart. They were very nice and charming and we had similar interests and personalities. It was not difficult to share part of the evening with them.
We've only sailed out of Miami (and Long Beach). On our previous Caribbean trips there was a fair number of black people. It didn't seem remarkable given that probably a fair number of Miami cruise patrons are locals unlike us. Well, the Fort Lauderdale cruising crowd was remarkably black. I would say perhaps even one-third. It turns out that Broward County has almost double the percentage of blacks as Miami-Dade.
Another notable thing, we noticed not a small number of mixed race couples and mixed race groups obviously traveling together. In light of all this and the current racial climate in the country, everyone seemed intent on going out of their way to be friendly and cordial.
We went to three shows and two of the comedy performers. Everything was quite well done. One of the on board performing groups, Smooth Operators, had a female lead vocalist with an amazing voice. There was also a remarkable male singer in the performing troupe and two very good female voices.
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