Coffee on the Verandah -The Last Slide, Recap & Souvies 5/29 - Link to Aulani TR 5/31

[englishrose47]

I will be in Nassau in May !!! I think we may do the Glass Bottom Boat so that will take up some time !! What other things should we do ???? What is a good buy there etc !!!?????

[eandesmom]

Originally Posted by FauntleroyFAN07

thats right...

hey what a minute im on the one day per month schedule...4 months back and on day 4 of the trip.

but i am 24 chapters into my report.

Nothing wrong with the 1 day per month schedule, on a per day update basis you definitely have me beat, day 7 and I'm at 25 chapters. You win! What, I'm not sure. Perhaps one of these

Originally Posted by FauntleroyFAN07

anywhoo, i enjoyed the update hope you guys get off the ship at least to bargan back and forth with the locals.

We do get off the ship.

Originally Posted by englishrose47

I will be in Nassau in May !!! I think we may do the Glass Bottom Boat so that will take up some time !! What other things should we do ???? What is a good buy there etc !!!?????

Honestly I don't have good advice there. We didn't buy anything. We probably would have looked for rum but there is a reason why we didn't and the straw market was a madhouse we didn't feel like dealing with. I can say walking by there wasn't anything I was even tempted to look at. There are some good reviews on the excursions options. People do seem to really like the Dolphin encounter but it was pricey as well. Our take on it was we were there for the cruise itself, and the weather, and the beach and as a result on this one were less concerned with actual excursions, although in Alaska we definitely went for them and I'm glad we did.

[MeMom]

Originally Posted by eandesmom

Oh God is so good today I have to share. I just got news that my HS friend with very rare cancer who underwent stem cell transplant and her last lumbar puncture came back clean with no evidence of disease. And my other friend battling breast cancer for 12 years (the one whose DH has brain cancer), who's doctors thought her cancer had metastasized to both lungs (but can't biopsy in her condition, too risky) it turns out she has a bizarre allergy to one of the chemo drugs, very very rare, but once they changed all her meds up she can breathe again and feels so much better. It's not in her lungs after all, I could cry with relief for both of these amazing ladies.

It is certainly good to hear anything positive when it comes to health issues, especially cancer.
That word just develops into something really ugly for too many people.

[eandesmom]

Originally Posted by MeMom

It is certainly good to hear anything positive when it comes to health issues, especially cancer.
That word just develops into something really ugly for too many people.

It really does and while I know a lot of it is just me getting older, I feel like I am seeing so much more of it in folks I know, than ever before.

[glennbo123]

Finally getting caught up. It's nice to see pictures of the Nassau port again....I think I was last there in 2008. It looks the same!

Great idea to order hot tea in order to brew your Via.

[FauntleroyFAN07]

sweet a picture of a drink.


rosie, i can tell you that when you go if you want to buy something never take there first price, always wait for a few offers lower.

[mrp4352]

I'm not all caught up yet, but I wanted to jump in about NYE. We just got back from a great trip. It was crowded, but we did the NYE 'preview' fireworks at the MK on the 30th. They do the full NYE firework show the night before. You can snag a great spot on the bridge leading to the hub about 30-40 minutes before the show (most of the crowd left after the second nighttime parade). Then, we spent actual NYE day at Animal Kingdom (longest wait - 20 minutes for Primeval Whirl, and that was because Dinosaur had just gone down so lots of people dumped into that ride area)and followed with the Hoop De Doo Review for our celebration. It made for a fun day with few crowds! Just another couple of thoughts for you...

[mickeystoontown]

Originally Posted by englishrose47

I will be in Nassau in May !!! I think we may do the Glass Bottom Boat so that will take up some time !! What other things should we do ???? What is a good buy there etc !!!?????

Not Cynthia but we were on the Dream last May and took the See and Sea Excursion:

http://disneycruise.disney.go.com/cr...d-tour-nassau/

If I had the opportunity to do it again, I would but I might skip the driving portion of the tour. Like others have said, Nassau is pretty dirty and I'm glad that we had a tour guide take us through the city. The city tour is one of those "been there, done that" things for us.

Here are the links to that portion of my trip report. Lots of pictures and descriptions:

http://www.disboards.com/showpost.ph...&postcount=693

http://www.disboards.com/showpost.ph...&postcount=694

http://www.disboards.com/showpost.ph...&postcount=732

http://www.disboards.com/showpost.ph...&postcount=780

[eandesmom]

Originally Posted by glennbo123

Finally getting caught up. It's nice to see pictures of the Nassau port again....I think I was last there in 2008. It looks the same!

Great idea to order hot tea in order to brew your Via.

We tried ordering hot water when we were on the Wonder and it confused the heck out of Room Service. And clearly we are too out of it first thing in the am to haul ourselves up to the drink station for the hot water. That's for cup #2!

Nassau really is lovely from the ship.

Originally Posted by FauntleroyFAN07

sweet a picture of a drink.

Yep, one official slushie credit!

Originally Posted by FauntleroyFAN07

rosie, i can tell you that when you go if you want to buy something never take there first price, always wait for a few offers lower.

Or just don't bother lol but never take the first price for sure. Walk away.

Originally Posted by mrp4352

I'm not all caught up yet, but I wanted to jump in about NYE. We just got back from a great trip. It was crowded, but we did the NYE 'preview' fireworks at the MK on the 30th. They do the full NYE firework show the night before. You can snag a great spot on the bridge leading to the hub about 30-40 minutes before the show (most of the crowd left after the second nighttime parade). Then, we spent actual NYE day at Animal Kingdom (longest wait - 20 minutes for Primeval Whirl, and that was because Dinosaur had just gone down so lots of people dumped into that ride area)and followed with the Hoop De Doo Review for our celebration. It made for a fun day with few crowds! Just another couple of thoughts for you...

Great info, thanks so much! I had some momentary panic today that the trip was derailing but it seems back on track, though very possibly with some adjustments.

Originally Posted by mickeystoontown

Not Cynthia but we were on the Dream last May and took the See and Sea Excursion:

http://disneycruise.disney.go.com/cr...d-tour-nassau/

If I had the opportunity to do it again, I would but I might skip the driving portion of the tour. Like others have said, Nassau is pretty dirty and I'm glad that we had a tour guide take us through the city. The city tour is one of those "been there, done that" things for us.

Here are the links to that portion of my trip report. Lots of pictures and descriptions:

http://www.disboards.com/showpost.ph...&postcount=693

http://www.disboards.com/showpost.ph...&postcount=694

http://www.disboards.com/showpost.ph...&postcount=732

http://www.disboards.com/showpost.ph...&postcount=780

I'm so glad you posted this Lisa! I couldn't remember which excursion you had but thought it had some stuff in it for Rosie and almost directed her to your TR! I'd skip that first driving tour part, reading about it in your TR made me glad we hadn't booked it.

[eandesmom]

Jeff and I had enjoyed a lovely morning, our first day in port. Coffee on the Verandah, a walk on the promenade and soaking in the beauty of Nassau from a distance. Lazy and lovely as it was, we did only have the one day in port and it was time to get moving. Or more accurately get other people moving. Walking back into the stateroom at 9:15 we found….3 kids out cold. So we woke them up. Breakfast at Cabanas, which we knew they wanted, was only open until 10:30. And while that might seem like a lot of time, we knew it would take them 15-30 minutes to come out of their deep fog, get dressed before we could get them all actually up to the buffet, which then didn't leave that much time to eat and not feel rushed.

After being blinded by the sun by the opening of the verandah curtain, they slowly got moving and we eventually made it to breakfast. I confess, I didn't take a single picture of it. I must have brought my phone with me as I took notes on my food but, alas, no pictures. The line was VERY disorganized. I believe it is supposed to work as pods, kind of like Boma does but everyone waits in line so it took a while to get the food and at first I was dismayed with the options. As I got further down I found Eggs Benedict, containers of yogurt and then a muesli bar in a separate area. They have a nice station for this, and I was able to add craisens, raisins, dried pineapple and flaxseed. My family thought it looked disgusting and I’m sure between that and Jeff eating oatmeal, we looked like old fogies as our kids loaded up their plates with waffles, very soggy looking eggs, donuts, bacon and sausage but we liked it. The Eggs Benedict on the other hand was…the typical sitting out buffet half hard have soggy version. It seems to me I had a Greek yogurt but I'm not positive as then on another day I don't think it was out but when I asked they might have brought me one. But I am not sure. Generally it seems to be the fruit flavored yogurt, Dannon or what have you, which I’m not a huge fan of and it's possible I grabbed that before I found the muesli. Overall it was what I expected. Basic breakfast buffet and not anything exceptional. The kids love it, Jeff and I not so much. Sadly, the room service offering for breakfast is quite small so the other option, sit down at Royal Palace, would have been my preference. Except no one else wanted to. Wah!

Breakfast done we headed back to the stateroom to grab our daypack for the day. I think we all just put suits on under our outfits but honestly don't recall. I know we brought sunscreen, phones and at least my camera, a few dry things to change into so we weren't heading back wet I'm not sure what else other than we tried to keep it at a minimum.

Finally, we got off the ship!

At 11:19.

Yeah, rope drop people we aren't by nature. Especially if there isn't a pressing reason to be, and there wasn't.

What's the first thing you do when you get off? Look back at your ship of course!







A few official photos taken we managed our way through Customs house and set out to find a cab to take us to the Sheraton. I had a map, and that's about it. Emerging outside you find a few things, walk one way to head into the main part of town, streets and shopping. Another to catch a cab, bus or…carriage. Yes, there are horse drawn carriages or just horses using the same area. And no, they don't clean up after them so you need to watch where you step. It is not remotely organized and we tried to get away from the crush and the hawkers and find a driver a little off the beaten path. We chatted with a few. Guess what? The Sheraton is at Cable Beach.



Which, if you look at the map isn’t all that far from the port (see the anchor). But Atlantis and Paradise Island are a lot closer. Cabs like multiple trips and one trip to cable beach could be 2 to Atlantis. As a result, it took us a little bit to find someone willing to drive us out there, but we did. And so we got into our cab, which was really a van



I tried to take a few shots long the way





Traffic was awful right in town so our guy did a bit of a roundabout route, after checking with us first (which was very nice of him)

This cemetery was kind of cool (what you can see of it in my pic)



And finally, more open road, once you get around the bend and out of town it is a pretty drive





The funniest part along the ride, especially as you got closer to Cable beach was the sheer volume of banks. Every kind of bank you can imagine. All those lovely offshore accounts I guess. It was really pretty funny. We went to check in and see about getting a day room for 5. I'd gotten nowhere trying to do it ahead of time as the rooms only sleep 4 and was a bit worried about getting one for 5, even though it was just for the day. No problem and they gave us the rate for 4. Mission accomplished, keys in hand we went to dump our stuff in the room and then hit the beach and pool. The room wasn't exactly around the corner, I think the day rooms are generally in a separate wing, under some shops. They'd asked us if we wanted ground floor and given our desired use of it we’d said we did. Finally, we found the room
The key didn't work, we were locked out.

We went back up

They re-keyed it.

We went back down. Again, not exactly around the corner.

The key still didn't work.

There was a housekeeper and a maintenance guy in the hall, they couldn't get it to work either, nor could they let us in.

We went back up. All of us.

They moved us to another room. Which seemed to take a very long time to enter in the system.

This was in a much different part of the hotel but also ground floor.

The key worked!

Apparently the whole thing wore Kendall out.



Either that or the teen club late night did. Or it was a 16 year old girl bored out of her mind. Take your pick.

They all plopped on the bed



Are you kidding me? We aren't here to stay in a hotel room!

But it did have a pretty nice location



And view



The pool looked inviting to the boys





No slide though which bummed them out

I liked the look of the beach



I didn't really like the look of these clouds



Oh wait, that’s better



With that we grabbed what we needed, locked up the room and headed out.
It was now 1pm. All aboard was at 6:15.

First order of business was...towels. In reality you could show up here, use the pool and beach and no one would have a clue if you were a resort guest. No wristbands or any requirement to show a key. At all. Except…to get a towel. Which was in a kiosk completely obscured and seemed to take us forever to find. With towels finally in hand the E’s headed to the pool, the rest of us to the beach with the E’s under clear instructions as to where we were and to check in. We found a spot and sat down. And promptly felt sand blowing in our face. That was enough to get Jeff and Kendall up and looking for activity.

I looked at the view

Of the pool bar. LOL!



Of the inflatable slide that was clearly not inflated (and I think you had to pay to go on anyway)



Of the Beach Volleyball



Which caught Kendall’s interest. Jeff went and found a volleyball, I don’t think he had to rent it but am honestly not sure, and they got busy playing

Continued in next post

[eandesmom]

Pretty soon, others wanted in on the action



While they were doing this, I took a nap.

Literally.

I did something I NEVER do, at least not on a trip with my kids (I did it at least once in Oct, perhaps more lol) I actually dozed in my lounge chair. It was pleasant out, not unbearably hot, I knew the E's were ok and knew where I was, Kendall and Jeff were having fun and I wasn't about to leave our stuff to go for an ocean swim. So I dozed. Most pleasantly I might add!

But didn't get many pictures of their furious 2 on 2 game that evolved lol.

Apparently it wore K out



Jeff said it was a great game but exhausting, they worked it for over an hour and with that, woke me up and we all went for a swim. It is a nice beach and the ocean was lovely. I tried to get the E’s to join us

This was Evan’s response



Eric wasn’t doing much more



I did ask him how the pool was and he perked up



But honestly, they were bored



And said so

And gave me pouty faces



First words out of their mouth

“Can we go back to the ship?”

Sigh.

Jeff and Kendall came aback about then too and she was voicing a bit of the same

Jeff and I eyed the pool bar



But instead got roped into a game of color tag with all 3 kids in the pool and did that for at least a half an hour. As we played the clouds grew darker and darker. And kids started to whine about being hungry. We'd assumed we'd just buy something there but looking at the skies, the bored faces of our children and our grumbling bellies we decided to call it a day. We lasted about 2 hours total from leaving the room to heading back in. Everyone got changed for the trip back and we went up to check out. While doing so I had to get more cash for the cab, it had been pricier than expected and let me tell you, those off shore banks have some icky fees, I want to say it was a $4 fee. I wish I could recall how much the cab ride was, but don't know. Checkout seemed to take a while, I'm not sure why other than it was the same person who checked us in and while she was sweet, she didn't really seem on top of it. Eventually we were out front of the hotel where catching a cab back to the port was light years faster and easier than the trip in. As our cab pulled out of the drive, it began to rain.


And rain

And RAIN

It rained so hard that the wipers could barely keep up and we could barely see out. It rained so hard, it bounced back up. It rained so hard the streets looked like they were flooding. In a town with horrible drainage, it’s not a very pretty sight. Arriving back at customs house we paid our driver (again a very nice one, we did luck out both ways in that regard) and dashed inside. While avoiding the rutted roads filled with…horse poop. Except it was now floating. Seriously nasty stuff but if you stayed on the sidewalk it was fine, just not fun to look at. Just that walk got us pretty wet. Evan wanted to look at all the booths for a necklace, we assured him there would be something at Castaway Cay and was able to keep him moving. Neither Jeff or I had any interest in engaging with any of the vendors for stuff none of us needed. Making our way through customs and heading out to the ship was another story, we were flat out DRENCHED as we ran on-board. Bless DCL for having towels right there for us. Our timing was just off. While we hadn't gotten drenched in the pool or on the beach, had we left just 15 minutes earlier we'd probably have made it back ok.

So what did I think? Honestly, I'm not sure. If you want to get off the ship, hit a beach and a decent pool, it really is a fine option. Would the kids have been equally bored at the Hilton, which was walkable? Probably, and possibly much more so as it is a much smaller pool. Kendall definitely would have been. Both she and Jeff really enjoyed playing volleyball and I really enjoyed my nap (in a lounger, on the beach, I mean really it doesn't get a lot better at that exact moment in time does it?). I'm glad I got to go in the ocean, even if it wasn't for all that long, it was a lovely little swim. Do I regret doing it? No, all things considered it was a relatively inexpensive outing as far as cruise excursions go, I think probably under $200 including room and cab fare both ways. It did take more time than I'd have liked to get in and settled and the weather did put a bit of a damper on things, had it been nicer or warmer the ocean may have been more tempting to the E's who didn't even go in it (Evan complained off and on over the course of the whole trip that the salt stung his skin). There were beach rentals (aqua trikes, kayaks I think) that looked interesting and could have been fun. I am glad we got off the ship and that the kids saw a different part of the world, some good and some a bit icky. Not horrible but definitely not what they are used to either. Would I do it again? Probably not but I did like getting some beach time and trying it at the public beach made us a little nervous. Not so much the getting there, but the getting back. I would probably push for a catamaran or something if there was a next time but honestly I really think we will look for other itineraries first. I do like getting off the ship, if only for a little bit. Basically it met my expectations, and I think Jeff's. It didn't exceed them but I can't say I was disappointed either. I think the kids were less interested in it, especially the beach part, than we expected and that part surprised and disappointed us a little and left us a little concerned about how Castaway Cay would go.

Port adventure aborted, what’s next?

[Flossbolna]

Sorry to hear that your beach day in Nassau did not really work out as intended. I am glad that you have such a relaxed attitude about it. And in some ways maybe it was quite good that nobody was that much into it as the rain would have cut the day short anyway. So this way the disappointment was much less.

To be honest, everything I read about most of those Caribbean ports is not really encouraging. Makes me think that cruising in the Med would be preferrable as it gives you warm weather, but ports that are a bit less "poor".

[MeMom]

Originally Posted by eandesmom

It really does and while I know a lot of it is just me getting older, I feel like I am seeing so much more of it in folks I know, than ever before.

I think that is what it is - the older we get, the more people we know, and the more people we know, the more problems there can be. I thought 2012 was bad for illnesses and deaths, and I was hoping 2013 would be better. However, in these first days of the new year, I know of three people who are at different stages of cancer fights. One is the dad of a church friend, and he is in his last days. He lost his son/my friend's brother to cancer about a year and a half ago, too, so this family has really been through some tough days.

Originally Posted by eandesmom

Pretty!

[Captain_Oblivious]

Originally Posted by eandesmom

Finally, we got off the ship!

At 11:19.

Yeah, rope drop people we aren't by nature. Especially if there isn't a pressing reason to be, and there wasn't.

Cruising is definitely a different style of vacation than theme-park touring!

Originally Posted by eandesmom

Yes, there are horse drawn carriages or just horses using the same area. And no, they don't clean up after them so you need to watch where you step.

I don't remember seeing that on the brochure.

Originally Posted by eandesmom

Traffic was awful right in town so our guy did a bit of a roundabout route, after checking with us first (which was very nice of him)

You're going the wrong way! I have to admit, the traffic pictures threw me for a second.

Originally Posted by eandesmom

The key didn't work, we were locked out.

We went back up

They re-keyed it.

We went back down. Again, not exactly around the corner.

The key still didn't work.

There was a housekeeper and a maintenance guy in the hall, they couldn't get it to work either, nor could they let us in.

We went back up. All of us.

They moved us to another room. Which seemed to take a very long time to enter in the system.

This was in a much different part of the hotel but also ground floor.

The key worked!

Originally Posted by eandesmom

Either that or the teen club late night did. Or it was a 16 year old girl bored out of her mind. Take your pick.

I'll take one of each.

Originally Posted by eandesmom

So I dozed. Most pleasantly I might add!

Nothing wrong with that!

Originally Posted by eandesmom

“Can we go back to the ship?”

Being part of the "lying around a pool or beach gets old after a while" crowd, I can understand. But nobody likes whining, either.

Originally Posted by eandesmom

It rained so hard the streets looked like they were flooding. In a town with horrible drainage, it’s not a very pretty sight. Arriving back at customs house we paid our driver (again a very nice one, we did luck out both ways in that regard) and dashed inside. While avoiding the rutted roads filled with…horse poop. Except it was now floating.

Ew...

Originally Posted by eandesmom

So what did I think? Honestly, I'm not sure.

Well, you tried it once. Not every experience is a home run, but you won't hit any if you never try.

[mickeystoontown]

Aww, too bad the day didn't go as well as you had expected. But, at least you got to see part of Nassau, enjoy some time on the beach, in the pool and nap time on your lounger.