Today is “turnaround day” for the cruise. We got up at about 6:45 AM, showered, and got dressed to go to the buffet for breakfast. It will be an interesting experience for us, we have never done “back-to-back” cruises before, so we are not quite sure what to expect. Last night, we received our new cruise cards and instructions on how the process works for those staying on board for the next cruise. It would have been easier if we were not changing cabins, or planning to get of the ship, but on our case, we were doing both.
Everything was packed, and we had our valuables in Stephanie’s backpack. We were not quite sure if we were supposed to wait in the cabin to be moved, or just go off the ship and let the ship’s personnel move us. In any event, we could not move until our next cabin was ready. Our cabin steward, Tony, was keeping us informed as much as he could. We opted to just wait in the cabin to see what transpired. About 9:00 AM, we got a knock on our door, and someone was there with a luggage cart to help us move all of our items. Stephanie and I helped to get the hanging clothes on the cart’s hanging rack, and we placed some of the smaller bags on the bottom of the cart. We both rolled a suitcase and off we went to the new room, one floor down and a little more forward.
We unloaded everything, and put the hanging clothes in the cabin closet and we were done moving. It had been pretty painless other than some of the uncertainty, and of course, packing and unpacking. The balcony cabin was set up a little differently from the previous inside cabin, so we had to figure out where to put things while we unpacked. The other interior room had actually been a little larger, and had more shelves and desk space. This balcony cabin had a bigger closet, but less shelves.
We went ahead and unpacked while we had the chance, and put our valuables in the safe. With passports in hand, as well as our two backpacks, we ventured to the passengers services desk to see about getting off of the ship. We either had the choice to remain on the ship and go through immigration at 11:30 AM in the Princess Theater, or get off of the ship and go through immigration just like we were leaving, and then get back onto the ship later with the normal Embarkation process. We did have special “Passenger in Transit” cards which we were supposed to show when both leaving and getting back on the ship.
We went through the normal Customs and Immigration, and after a short wait in line with the other passengers who were leaving to go home, we handed our Customs Form to the custom’s agent. Since we had purchased a ring for Stephanie in St. Thomas, we had put that value on the customs form as well as some other small items. The agent indicated we would have to pay duty since we were allowed only $800 per person duty free. I asked about the additional exemption for having visited St. Thomas, which doubles the normal exemption to $1,600 per person, which more than covered our purchases. He asked if we had made the purchase in St. Thomas, and we said yes, and then he said we were right about the additional exemption and let us go through. I had to believe it was a test, and that after having already processed most of the passengers from the ship, he certainly knew that the ship had visited St. Thomas. I am not sure why the US Customs has to be such a burdensome experience as compared to other countries.
We walked out of the terminal and started our walk to Publix to purchase some items, specifically canned Canada Dry Ginger Ale. We first stopped off at a Walgreens, which was really close to the port, just to check prices. We continued on to Publix, which was probably about one mile away.
We also visited the Total Wine, and decided to purchase two bottles of White Zinfandel to put in the cabin refrigerator. We are allowed to bring on two bottles at Embarkation. Next, we went into Publix, and they were having a Buy Two, Get Two Free special on the Canada Dry Ginger Ale 12-pack of cans. We had not intended to purchase that much, so we asked if we could get two for half the price of four, but that was not how the special worked, so we ended up getting four 12-packs. We also purchased some fresh limes for our beverages since the limes on the ship had not been that fresh so far, they are just cut up too many days in advance.
We loaded up all of the ginger ale in our backpacks, along with the other supplies and started the walk back to the ship. Of course, all of the extra weight made the walk harder, and the hot, humid weather did not help. By the time we got back to the terminal, we were both pretty sweaty.
We asked a port attendant about getting back on board and to see if our “In Transit” cards would shorten the process. We got to go to the head of the security screening line, and made it through without incident. Since we already had our cruise cards, we did not have to do the check-in, which was pretty crowded by this time. We were led to the Elite holding area, and by the time we got there, boarding was in progress, so a short time later, we were back in the room. It had taken about 25 minutes from the time we got to the terminal to the time we got to the room on the ship, not bad.
We changed into our bathing suits, applied sunscreen, and headed to get some lunch in the buffet before heading out to the pool deck to lounge in the sun.
A little later, we purchased a bucket of Dos Equis beer, which is buy four, get five. This was our first direct alcohol purchase for the cruise, and it felt funny after being on the beverage package for the previous cruise.
We also did not have to attend the emergency drill, another benefit of having already been on the ship from the first cruise, which was another first for us, and a little eerie. We did see a few other passengers, presumably from the first cruise, who also stayed out by the pool during the drill. The entire drill was played on the PA system, so we still had to listen to the drill. The best part was the update the Captain gave on tomorrow, and the proximity of the cruise to the path of Hurricane Joaquin.
The Captain announced that we would not be going to Princess Cays tomorrow, which we had anticipated from yesterday’s experience, where it was too rough to visit there. In addition to skipping Princess Cays, we would be taking a different route, much nearer to Cuba through what the Captain said was the Old Bahama Channel. He did not expect the weather to be that bad other than some higher wind, rain and rougher seas, but we were not expected to be closer than about 220 miles from the hurricane. We will just be adding another sea day as we head to St. Thomas, where we are still scheduled to arrive on time on Sunday morning.
The ship left promptly at 4:00 PM, and we had a nice sail away. We talked with a couple from Saskatchewan, Canada who had boarded today. Aye! They were nice, even with all of the Aye’s thrown in during the conversation.
It was a pleasant sail away, and had been nice sitting in the sunshine knowing we were in for a cloudy, windy day tomorrow.
We have a much more personable cabin steward on the cruise, he is also from India, similar to Tony, our last steward, but has a much better and friendly personality. His name is Kushalie. Of course, for this cruise, we are getting him to bring ice for our cooler each day so we can enjoy all of our stocked supplies.
We did find out from one of our bartenders at the Seaview bar, Jorge, that there are happy hours on board where we can buy beer at buy one, get one for $1, so he suggested we purchase several, and he will change them out for cold ones any time we want, a great suggestion since we could not keep them cold in our already loaded refrigerator. That is even a better deal than the bucket special.
It had been a long day, and almost as tiring as last Embarkation Day, but still easier. We did not want to go to the dining room, so we showered and got dressed for the buffet for our diner, which is our tradition on Embarkation days. Afterward, we headed back to the cabin to relax and watch college football on the TV, and enjoy some of the Rhine Wine we brought on board and have been keeping cold for the last ten days.
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