DAY 5 ST KITTS WEDNESDAY

This will be our first time in St Kitts and I found plenty of options I was interested in. We were in port from 10am-8pm and I was super excited.

Our roll call had someone that arranged a group "tour" with the main attraction being transportation to Cockleshell Beach/Reggae Beach. Since this was one of the places on my "list", I jumped right on this tour with everyone else, hoping to save some money. With this tour, they would pick you up in either an open air bus or enclosed, tour you around Basseterre and tell you a little about the history (everyone knows I don't do "tours" but this was just a little driving by it and telling you things along the way type of tour-no stopping). Then there would be a stop at the top of Timothy Hill for 10 minutes to get pictures. Then on to Reggae Beach where they would have a reserved chair, umbrella and complimentary drink waiting on you. Then it included your ride back to the port, with the options of 2 different times to leave (early and late). This was booked using PEREIRA TOURS and the cost was $15pp. It sounded like a great deal to me and we went for it.

Of course, I know just from trying to get "my group" of kids and grand-kids together on any particular cruise...is quite the challenge. Our group to Reggae consisted of about 108 people. Yikes! I really wondered how it would go and several times I felt as if I should just pull out of this group tour. I mean was it really worth saving a few bucks on a taxi ride? We'd soon see. 

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So I'm not even sure what time we got up today, but I do know I received my normal wake up call. Today's wake up call is brought to you by the pans and pots hockey team who will be playing right above your room for the next few hours. We have arranged a smelly aroma to the players field for your enjoyment and to enhance your senses. We want to make sure you get up on time...😁

So outside I went to check out the situation. It looked as if we were here and smelled as if someone took out the trash and placed it on my balcony. Let's all hold our noses while I get some pictures.

Yep, it pretty much looked like all those other "St." islands we've been to.

We had company

Breakfast is my favorite meal of the day and I could eat it for any meal. The hubby was getting a little burned out on the same breakfast daily, so we decided to head to the Blue Iguana for a breakfast burrito.

He was super excited.

And they were good, just like the last time on the Pride. I just wish they offered a regular soft burrito shell instead of only wheat or jalapeno. I don't do spicy and I don't really care for "wheat" anything. But, that's pretty much my only option. Sigh. Wheat just has somewhat of a "bitter" taste to me.

The Captain came on to tell us that we would be a little late into port. Um...ok, we are sitting right here! He mentioned something about the wind and waves. Seriously? Where is this at? I don't see either. The Celebrity ship left after we did (from San Juan) and had been following us. But they were now going around us and docking while we waited on them. The Captain mentioned that we would now be docking around 10:30am instead of 10am.

Traffic jam...

This kinda reminds me of Bermuda with the pastel colored houses.

It was about 10am when we started coming in.

I "gots prime viewing" from my loud, smelly balcony. 🤪 

Sakari really wanted to know how these men got there...I told her when they didn't see any sharks around, they went for it, jumped and swam over.

These men were screaming and yelling at Celebrity. Like one of them was super mad about something. He would throw his hands up in the air, scream, do the "about-face" walk and then turn back to repeat.

I can only assume that these ropes some how got stuck somewhere because they would be pulling and not getting anywhere with them.

The guy finally threw his hands up one last time, slammed the rope down and walked over to our ship and tied us up instead. HA! I guess we'll be docking earlier than expected and Celebrity will have to wait to dock at 10:30 "due to the waves and wind". We were docked by 10:15am.

We headed down one flight of stairs and off the ship we went. (Have I mentioned how much I actually like being down this low?)

St Kitts very own rock collection:

Sakari has started collecting rocks lately. She thinks that every rock has some type of fossil on them. I swear she can see a "shell" or "starfish" or a face in every shell and she will convince you that it's a fossil. She is keeping them in a box and she will take them to the bus stop every morning (including this morning) to show her friends. I swear all her friends thinks she's nuts...and they are right.

I'll show you around the shopping port area first (even though a majority of these were taken upon our return later that day) just to get it out of the way.

I know some don't like these built up areas at the port and also say that you can get better deals if you walk outside the port. But, I like them and they are convenient for grabbing something on the way back to the ship and not having to search all over town for that "deal". I'm willing to pay a little more for this convenience.

The one thing I really didn't like about San Juan is they didn't have this convenience...and I'll tell you why. I ALWAYS get a tee shirt and a refrigerator magnet from every port we visit. When we came back from San Juan, we completely forgot about both of these and when let off by the driver, we just simply headed back to the ship and forgot. I was heartbroken when I discovered this and now I'll just have to go back to get them...and hopefully remember.

I really don't get the concept of having a casino right there as you get off the ship. Do people really get off the ship and go gamble? I means there's a casino on the ship for heavens sake.

To read about our day at Reggae Beach, click the following link:

Back at the port, Sakari managed to talk me into getting another whale/dolphin/something along that species stuffed animal. It was a pretty nice size and I figured being in port and all, it would be expensive. However, they only charged us $3.50 and I had a happy child for the rest of the day.

The port was packed with cruisers returning from their daily adventures.

This guy was walking around with a monkey on his shoulder

Sakari with her new toy

We got back on the ship and headed up one floor to our room. Once again, I'm going to mention how much I love being so close to below and it's so easy to get on and off the ship and not have to worry about the crowded elevators.

We showered, put our things away and went to go find food. We hadn't ate since that morning and we were starved. But, once again, nothing was open. I just can't believe this! Lunch had ended at the buffet at 3:30pm and would not be opening up again until 6pm. BlueIguana Cantina had closed at 2:30pm and wouldn't be opening up again. The pasta bar at Cucina closed at 2:30pm too. This was just ridiculous! Seriously. The only option we had again was Guy's Burger. We had already had that plenty of times and I was really not in the mood for another hamburger.

We waited on the kids club to open and drop Sakari off so that she could have her dinner. At 6pm we started looking for food again and the buffet had all the blinds closed. We sat down in front of it. At 6:30pm, still all the blinds closed. At this point I was a little pissed and tired and hungry...well starving actually and when we get to the point that we are starving, we get irritable.

I stopped several employees and ask what time does the buffet open...can you believe they both told me "I'm not sure".....SERIOUSLY? You work here and you are unsure? You are cleaning up dishes, this is obviously YOUR work area and you don't know. On the second person I ask, a little boy, I'm guessing around 10 years old, overheard me and he said "It's open in the back". I thanked him and went over to tell the hubby. Of course we knew that the deli is open from 11am - 11pm and it was located in the back. I just knew that was what he was referring to, but we went anyhow.

However, we were pleasantly surprised to find that the buffet was actually open back there. I have no idea why it wasn't open in the front either...especially since this is considered "dinner" time.

We finally got some food in our bellies and went to go hang out on the deck and relax for awhile and reflect on the day.

We thought St Kitts was beautiful. We had a decent time, not the best, but decent. I mean any day at the beach is a good day for us, even with little bumps along the way. It could have been worse. I did learn my lesson and I think from now on I will be sticking to doing things on my own, even if it means paying a little more (although it wasn't in this case, it would have been cheaper). The advantages to doing it on your own is that you have a private driver (or at least a smaller group), you can leave the port right away...which means you get more time at the beach. You arrive sooner than a huge group and probably have a better choice of a place to sit. Then of course you don't have to worry about waiting for a crowd, head count and so on, for the return trip home. Yep, I think I will not worry too much about the cost from now on and just do it myself (well unless there's REALLY a big difference, then I would have to think twice about it).

I probably will never return back to Reggae. It was ok and to me, just a typical beach bar area, nothing special, no wow factors and nothing that would really bring me back here. I would definitely pick another place next time.

We headed to pixels to see if we could find our pictures from the day and did manage to find them after searching f.o.r.e.v.e.r!

I'm really not sure what the deal is with the color of these pictures taken by the ship photographers. They all have a funny color to our skin. In person, these pictures give off a weird dull look to our skin and look as if they took pictures using a green colored lens. I think they photog's need a lesson in white balance or something.

We dropped off our pictures and I wanted to take a few pictures of us at St Kitts in the dark. They did not turn out well this time. Maybe because I was in a hurry to get to the casino and try my luck for the night and I didn't take the time to focus.

Tonight I would do pretty good on the Fisherman Bob's slot machine and on a 777's game. Around 9:44pm we headed to the kids club to pick Sakari up. It was Pirate night there and she had her face painted.

They had also given her a Pirate face mask and a few toys and she got to make her own telescope. We headed back to the room.

Our towel animal for the night.

She was real excited about her "slime hands"...I hate these things because they leave an oily residue on the walls and ceilings if you sling them up there and they will also pick up every known hair in the room. Disgusting.

She looked over on her bed and found a gift.

She was super excited and I explained to her that her birthday would be 2 weeks after we got home from the cruise, but I was allowing her to open one of her gifts while on the cruise. I reminded her that she would need to remember on her birthday that she had already received one on the cruise. She agreed and dug right in.

As soon as she seen the "special" bags her presents came in, she immediately knew what it was.

I don't think I've seen a happier kid...

It's always great to surprise them with something they didn't ask for or were expecting.

So here's her birthday present...

Sakari was starving and that meant we would have to go search for food...we also knew that we wouldn't find anything unless it was pizza. So, pizza it was.

Sakari is such a home-body. Like seriously, she would pick staying at home over just about anything. When we go out to eat, she begs to stay home and just have us bring her something home. We go for a walk at night, she'd rather stay home. I want to go shopping and she would rather stay home. Sigh.

So, she wanted us to go get her pizza and bring it back. We told her we could not just leave her there and she'd have to come with us. We were not at home and her brother and his finance was not home to watch her. She wasn't happy that she had to change out of her new mermaid outfit, but finally agreed and said "but I want to come back to the room and eat".

Up to the Pizza Pirate we went and I couldn't believe there wasn't a line. Only 3 people in front of us. I really hate eating in the room and not having a table to eat at...just as much as I hate stopping somewhere and eating in a car. I would just rather eat at a table! We sat down at a table and she had the biggest fit saying I promised we'd go back to the room.

We ate our pizza, she sat there. When it was time to go back, she took her pizza with her and then ate in the room, just as she said she would. Sigh. We headed to bed by midnight...to hear the clanging sounds of the galley above. Is it really possible to drop this many pots and pans every single night? I think they need more training or stop putting grease on their hands. I don't know what the problem is. 🙁