I woke up about 7 am to the sun gleaming in the windows (just the crack in the curtain, no we didn’t sleep with the curtains pulled) and I think from the excitement of being at our first port, my automatic alarm clock woke me up. I started getting ready for the day then went out on the deck below to see what was out there. Then back up to the room to wake up the family and get ready. I double-checked everything to make sure we had all that we needed since I had been such a screw-up for this vacation already, I didn’t want to disappoint again.

We headed up to the buffet for breakfast (which is usually what we do every day on every cruise with the exception of the Pearl where we went to Cagneys a few times for breakfast since we were VIP). We like the buffet since you can get in, eat, and get out quickly and watch us pull in to the port.

We pulled in to the port and I decided to not take any pictures since this was a new camera and I didn’t know how long the batteries lasted on this thing AND no back up batteries were coming along with me this trip. When I first purchased my other camera, I learn very quickly that back up batteries are a must and I had taken so many snorkeling pictures that my camera was dead by the time we headed to the next destination that trip (which was a very picturesque view of the island looking down at all the cruise ships in port in St Thomas)…dead battery, 2 pictures taken, then done for the rest of the day. Bummer.

We did have some time to kill since we were not arriving at this port until 10am. My husband wasn’t too happy with me that I had woken him up so early that day. So we sat on the deck with him glaring at me giving me that “You’re lucky I have tons of coffee in me right now after waking me up this early when I could be sleeping” look.

When they made the announcement that it was time to leave, we headed off the ship (it wasn’t too bad getting off at all) and walked our way down the VERY L-O-N-G pier.

The Star decided to park all the way out at the farthest part and around the corner pier. I’m not sure why. There weren’t any other ships there. When we docked before on the Spirit, she was at the closest. The walk was LONG. We missed the little “tram” that takes you up to the land…boo hiss. It would have definitely been worth it today. They take tips and it’s pretty big. So if you dock far, catch that tram if you can. It will save your legs!

I decided “hey, this would be a great opportunity to stop and take a picture of the hubby and daughter with the Star in the background and had them “pose” several different times…in reality, I just wanted to stop walking and take a breath but I wasn’t admitting to that and used this as an excuse.

Once we made it to land, we quickly went through the pier (still more walking…whew) to get to the part that you go out of the tourist area.

I couldn't help myself and managed to take a few pictures along the walk out of the pier.

Now I remember this place from before. We were eaten alive by no-see-ums and mosquitos that time around. But no bites yet. I looked ahead and knew we were supposed to keep walking forward to find the taxi station. I had no idea where I was going because I had never been any further than right there outside of the pier and then I was picked up to go to Maya Chan. I’m not sure why this new place we were going (Almaplena) couldn’t pick us up at that spot. Maybe they have to pay a charge to be able to enter the port area? We had read that you walk to the Hard-Rock-Café building for the taxi’s, but the Hard-Rock was out of business, so we were doing this blindly. We had also been warned by the staff at Almaplena not to let any taxi’s drivers try to lure you in to their cab before we get to where we were supposed to be going because they did not have contracts with Almaplena and then we would be responsible for the fare. It’s kind of hard to know if you have the right cab or not then if you a) don’t know where you are going b) never been outside the port c) there are taxi’s everywhere and d) the Hard-Rock Café is gone now (with no signage) so it was hard to tell “where” we were actually supposed to go.

It was very pretty there along the walk. The locals there would ask you take you somewhere or to do a trip with them, but a simple “we already have reservations” shut them up and they never said another word.

We finally made it to where we were going and I kept thinking “man, this was more of a walk that what I had originally thought” and of course looking at the pre-printed map I had in hand, it didn’t look as far as it was.

We made it to a spot where we thought THIS “might” be it. We ask one of the locals standing there and our luck had it that he didn’t speak English. Yes, he was the taxi driver. There was a young boy there with him and he relayed the information to him on what we were saying. “Si” he said, he would take us there. However, in the back of my mind I kept wondering if THIS was the cab we were supposed to be taking or not. I pulled out my reservation papers and handed them to him…just hoping to get some type of confirmation that he was indeed planning on taking us there under this contract they had with the taxi drivers. “Si”.

(On our way back, I tried to snap a picture of the "taxi meeting" spot for reference as to where to go)

So to read my full review of our trip to ALMAPLENA, you can go to my Costa Maya page where the review is. Also located in the button below.

The same driver that had dropped us off picked us up (No hablo Ingles vs No hablo espanol = another boring non-speaking trip back to the port). 

They built this port for the cruise ships and I have to say it’s pretty there and plenty to do. The road leading up to the port is very nice. I was trying to snap some pictures as our driver weaved in and out of other vehicles and taxis like if we were in a race to get to the port before everyone else. Our driver did drop us off inside the port turn around area. I’m not sure why they are allowed to drop us off there but not pick us up there??? We just had to show our ship cards to the “guard” at the entrance. Maybe certain drivers are not allowed past the guard without a cruiser? But then how do the others get in there to take cruisers somewhere? 

I tried snapping some pictures as we were driving (it wasn’t an easy thing to do so they’re not the best). 

Pulling on to the main road that takes you to the port:

Going down the road headed to the port:

Everything is brightly colored in Mexico for sure:

So we get out of the cab and NOW I UNDERSTAND…I know why this particular taxi driver was weaving in and out of the traffic and passing taxis like he was racing…anyone notice his number (for all of you race fans out there)? Yep, that explains it. This is a picture of the turnaround area for pick up/drop off of cruisers.

When you walk back in to the port, it’s like a “grand entrance” welcoming you back. Could this be Costa Mayas “Grand Atrium”? hehe All it’s missing is the stairs and water fountains. Oh wait…those are inside. No worries.

When they built this port for the cruisers, they took out their easel and splashed every bright color they could on each building. I love the colors everywhere. It’s so bright and cheery. However, for those taking pictures, it does create a color cast on everything around it. Depending on what building you may be by, you could end up with a yellow, blue, orange, red, or pink face. I prefer rainbow, but they didn’t have that building.

I know there are always people on here asking if there was a place to go in port to hang out for the day instead of leaving the port area. Of course there is. It wouldn’t be my decision because just getting off the ship and visiting the “tourist” area is not experiencing the place you are at. However, there are some that just go for the cruise or ship instead of “where” they are actually going. I won’t judge you, it’s your choice. So, I thought I would take some pictures of “their” swimming facilities there and beach area.

If you want to just hang out by the pool, it’s a rather large pool and has the swim up bar stools in the water that is at the bar. There are water fountains in the pool and steps to hang out on as well. There is a ledge all around the pool if you would just like to sit on the edge and put your feet in.

They have a man-made beach area around the pool with lounge chairs and hard fake type sand that they sit on. It is kind of made so that it is in the middle of all the surrounding shops, but yet kind of divided from it by a “curb” all the way around the chairs area. That way you don’t really have people shopping just walking through the area that you are lounging and swimming in.

 My daughter, being the fish, whale, or shark that she is (she pretends to by some type of animal every day so you just never know) decided she had not had enough water and swimming for the day and immediately headed to the pool. She did not get to swim in it last time we were in port, so we decided to let her hang out there a little bit before heading back down the long pier to the ship. That was my opportunity to go off exploring the port a bit more and getting some pictures that I had not been able to obtain on our last visit. I put on my shades in order to not be color blinded and off I went.

Making my way around the area just taking random pictures because that's what I do...especially with a new camera trying to figure it all out.

Of course I'm sure everyone has seen this picture floating around here, but in case you didn't...here it is, an arial view of the port. No I can not take credit for this picture. I have not been up in an airplane in Costa Maya.

Of course the port has the normal souvenir shops for trinkets, tee shirt shops offering wonderful reduced prices “come in take a look”, obviously the WONDERFUL jewelry stores that are cruise ship stamped approved places that they really push you to buy when in port because it’s listed in every daily. They have a Senior Frogs and another bar that you can get food at as well. I did notice they had a building that said dolphin swims. I did notice this on our previous cruise but never paid attention. I just figured it was a building you could book the swims and then they took you there. I was wrong. 

I wondered off around the pool and out toward the ocean area that faces the ship. I had always wanted to see that “beach” area with the palapas to see what it was like. I had read before that it wasn’t really a “beach” that you could swim at or get in to the water. That is a definite correct statement. Nothing but a rocky area there and a small man-made like beach with chairs under the palapas. I knew this would be a good opportunity to get a picture of the ship at the port. BUT, I did discover THIS is where the dolphin swim was. I had no idea. The area was VERY small and just was not appealing at all. I felt sorry for the dolphins if this is the only area they have to live in. How sad.

I had to bring my daughter back so that she could see the dolphins. She had done the dolphin swim last year in Cozumel and loved it. We watched the dolphins interact for a while with the trainers and there were about 3 swimmers in there with them swimming.

There is a neat bright yellow tall building in the port, if you have enough left in you after a full day in Costa Maya, you should walk up in to it and climb the stairs to the top. There is a wonderful view of the port and you can get a picture of the ship when up there too.

To the back side of it, you can find an aerial view of….nothing on the other side of the port. Just all greenery and totally not built up.

Caution: those of you they easily get dizzy may experience side-effects which may or may not be limited to: getting dizzy, feeling like you are on a spiral rollercoaster, the urge to not take another step, hallucinations that you are spiraling down a staircase and that the bright yellow sun is blinding you. Proceed with caution.

Yep, there were a lot more, but I didn’t want to scar you for life.

All the fountains and areas around the port are beautiful as well, but I didn’t take any pictures of them since we did that last time around. If you want to see those, you’ll have to head over to my Spirit review. 

I figured we had a full fun day and it was time for that dreaded walk back to the ship. No I take that back, an exciting long brisk skip back to the ship because I was having a burst of energy at the moment after feeling like Rocky once I had climbed to the top of the building on the spiral staircase. (Totally rolling my eyes right now and even my eyes were tired at that point). 

Remember that tram I was telling you about in the beginning and how you should catch it if you can for your ride in to port because it will save your legs from a lot of walking? Well, this is that tram and as you notice it's coming TOWARD us, not away...which means once again we missed it and would continue to have to walk the rest of the way. No, I'm not complaining...I still have that burst of energy I mentioned earlier.

The hubby stopped to take the cheesy "holding the ship in your hand" photo for me (I was just having another one of those "I need an excuse to stop before I drop moments).

The Star sitting in port, still all by her lonesome so far away for where she COULD HAVE PARKED!!! She thought it was funny and was grinning at me when I finally made it to the end of the pier and at her side. She knew she had worn me out that day, but felt it necessary to make me get my exercise because she knows me oh so well with the food on the ship. I'm pretty sure it was her goal to have me gain 10 pounds, but was going easy on me and only made me gain 7 pounds because she had me walking everywhere instead.

The beautiful Norwegian Star:

We got back on board and went to our room to shower and change then back out on the deck for some “going away” pictures. 

Did I really walk that far? Twice?

Oh here comes that tram that we never managed to catch:

The sun was setting. I don't know why but the skies seem to have a powdery blue, pink, orange in the afternoons this cruise. I had never noticed that before when we cruised. It was different. Is it due to the time of year? It was really pretty.

When we returned the beautiful Norwegian Star had a new Christmas surprise for us. They had sat up a gingerbread village while we were away. (I seen them carrying part of it in the morning down the hallway and knew something was up). I checked it out for a long time. All of the little details were just so cute. It was a busy Santa village for sure and so much to see.

We ate at the buffet. Today was a good day and they had tons of different types of sandwiches and cold-cuts, which was all that I was interested in after a long hot day in the sun.

Sakari is always the first to finish eating and some how we managed to sit in the "adult" area this time and wasn't forced to eat with our knees pressed against the munchkin table. She climbed up in to the window to look out and pretend her hands were now a dolphin swimming in the water. (Since the people at Almaplena had mentioned they seen dolphins that day...it was on her mind the rest of the day).

For desert, I had pound cake and some type of “strawberry” something or other and let me tell you it was HEAVEN. It was so good I went back and repeated this plate again.

There is something about NCL’s “cream” that I just love. I have yet to find it in any of the stores and I swear it’s not just plain whipped cream. They must add a pound of sugar to each tablespoon of cream. It’s addicting and I’m pretty sure this is where I find my extra souvenir pounds that I bring home with me each cruise. They use it for their crapes, they have it as a topping for the waffles or pancakes in the morning and now in the deserts too? I feel a sickness coming on from eating too much of this stuff during the cruise. 

After our bellies were full we headed up to the Bier Garten to hang out for a while waiting for the sunset to get a few pictures. My daughter entertained me with a few pictures. She has a personality like mommy and daddy and in a split second she can change things up. Never a dull moment.

I always take a lot of pictures of the sunset each cruise but I’m kind of to the point where a sunset in the Caribbean is a sunset. Been there, done that and they all start to look the same. I took a few this cruise, but not as much as I usually do.

We took the munchkin to the kids club after she had begged and begged to go visit her friends and she had fun doing Nickelodeon Activities without Dora & Spongebob because they were busy on the Epic instead. (I wish they had the characters on all the NCL ships).

Daddy and I headed to the casino of course. I wanted to make sure that NCL was able to get their money’s worth out of me this cruise. My husband had other plans and like the last day, he did well. I think after the last 3 cruises, he has been a little upset at me for being the one to win all the time and he finally put his foot down and decided he was the winner on this cruise. (Shhh, don’t tell him, I secretly let him be the winner this time. I mean a man can only take so much right?)

Now let’s discuss the bathrooms at the Casino. Hmmm…of course I can only vouch for the women’s restroom. Well, I could almost vouch for the men’s; my husband stopped me once or twice from entering the men’s restroom. I tell ya my GPS just was NOT working this entire cruise. One of the stall was constantly getting stopped up. I’m not sure if something about the Casino brought out an explosion in someone there every night of the week, but it was always stopped up or over flowing..then eventually out of order only for the same thing to happen the following night. The a/c or something must have been leaking in there because there were puddles on the floor (not beside a toilet or the sink) that would gather every day. There was a stall that didn’t have a lock on it AT ALL. Like we are talking no lock and just a peep hole. If you were the lucky one to have to use that stall, you better have a fast reaction to grabbing the door when others tried to open it. Thank goodness all my years of motherhood paid off for me and I have a pretty fast reaction. There was another stall that the door was kind of broken or at least off the hinge at the bottom and the door shut crooked and looked as if it was going to fall off. I find this all not up to par with any of the NCL’s I have been on. Not at all up to par. What was going on?

Drinks at the bar (for us soda card people)…never had any problems getting a drink when ask. I pretty much had my husband trained by the first few days. I would hand him the soda cards and he would go get them. They knew him in a short period of time and knew exactly what he was there to get and got it without him even telling them after a few days. As always, it was poured from a 2 liter and was always loaded with ice and tasted watered down. You want good fountain pop that’s not watered down? Head to the Red Lion or buffet. That’s where you will find it. There was only 1 other place that had the fountain soda and I never did hear where he said it was nor did I find it.

Ok, time to pick up our daughter and grab dinner at 10:30 and then back to the room to pack for our port day in Belize tomorrow. Away I went…the wrong direction again. Don’t worry, my GPS told me to “please turn around and head the other direction when it is safe to do so”.

Munchkin came back with her face painted. She claimed she was a giraffe tonight.

It's too bad she ate most of her face paint off with her meal.

We went to the Blue Lagoon and I ordered the Fish and Chips. It was pretty good. I topped it off with my favorite…cheesecake made my way…plain cheesecake (no strawberry topping frou-frou or icky chocolate) and top that baby with some cream!!! Cream all over. Actually just give me a plate full of cream and throw a piece of cheesecake as a topping on it and I’ll be fine.

Remember that mixed personality Sakari has? She went from this:

to asleep in about 5 minutes and had to be carried by daddy back to the room.

This night Santa had left Sakari chocolate mints on mommy and daddys pillows again and he made her an elephant. It had my Santa hat on. I guess he was feeling festive that day. She woke up long enough to eat her mints, scream with excitement about the towel animal, get her face washed off and she was out!

I was packing and looking through all of my paperwork for the next port day (you know the OCD stuff I have in folders) and I looked down on our desk full of collected papers that I keep for use with my scrapbook after the cruise and what do I find? The tickets for the “Silver” latitude party that we missed today!!! GASP…oh no. We missed a meeting with more free drinks? How could this have happened? Darn. I could have been a winner this time around. The group had to be smaller than the last. Kicking myself now but what can you do? I’ll have to catch it next time around to see what is different about it compared to the Bronze.

For those of you that were following the Star when she had her little accident in Bermuda and hit another ship due to high winds several months ago…if you are wondering…nope, they did not fix her fender bender. I checked.

Back at the room, I think this was the day I ran in to the room steward finally and told him about leaving the beds the way we had them and he had left them that way and guess what? I did notice the big dust bunnies on the floor had been captured and taken away to dust bunny heaven. That was a positive thing. However, still the same old wet towels from day one. I had finally had enough and took out my handy-dandy notebook (no wait that’s from Blue’s Clues)…I took out the card that the staff had given us the day before at the meet & greet and called to let them know our towels had not been changed since the first day and I was getting a little tired of using wet towels. They said they would send someone up with fresh towels. Now I’m a water freak, just like my daughter. But I like to take showers 2-3 times a day. I always take one when I wake up so that I can wake the body up and get moving and wet my hair so that I can fix it for the day. I take a hot shower in the evening so that I can relax my body and go to sleep easier. Then while on the ship of course you are talking more showers after swimming or being at the beach. I had some wet towels!!! Plus I need 2 towels, one to dry off with and one to put my hair up in when I get out. Two gentlemen dressed up like they were important arrived at the door about 20 minutes later with fresh towels. I ask if they wanted the old ones and then grabbed a couple that I had hung up on the outside of the door to attempt to dry them. One of the guys immediately said that I needed to throw them on the floor in order to get fresh towels. I told them they had been on the floor once, but I ended up having to hang them up because I needed dry towels to use since I didn’t get any fresh ones. He just kept telling me that I needed to make sure that I threw everything on the floor to get new ones in the future. It was kind of strange because he was telling me this all in a very argumentative way. Hmmm, I’m from a time that you don’t argue with a customer. Explaining is one thing, but this guy got argumentative and defensive. It was just weird and I had never been spoken to this way by any NCL employee. So after that…all towels, hand rags, washrags ended up on the floor! Guess what happens after I do that? My extra 4th towel went away never to return again and 2 of my washrags went away never to return again. Hmmm…were they punishing me? I also noticed funny little things that I could not do anything but chuckle at; my husbands clothes, no matter where they were at, would always been folded and put somewhere...either on the bed, the chair or the table. Mine...never touched. Still wadded up where I took them off at even if they were beside the hubbys. LOL

Like I’ve said, I’m not really the complaining type, so I left it at that and never said another word. I chalked this up to having the absolute worse steward service I’ve ever had on any cruise. More bad service to come…

Since I’m on that “negative” side right now, I’ll go ahead and mention a few other negatives during the cruise. Those of you that are Star lovers, hide your eyes and just skip this part. I know there are tons of people who just LOVE the Star and have sailed on her several times and have additional sailings booked on her, but this is my opinion and what I experienced and I can only compare THIS ship to the others in the fleet I have sailed. So here goes…

Back to the restrooms. If you decide you have to potty when you are up at the pool deck area, DO NOT, I repeat DO NOT go in to the ladies restroom and hit the first stall you come to. I disappeared for a while and panicked when I went in here one night and couldn’t get out. I was the only one in here and no matter what I did; turning the handle, moving the lock back and forth, nothing worked. What was I going to do? I did the only thing I could do…I kicked the door until it broke open. Whew…you talk about scared and wondering how long it would be before someone entered this restroom to save me. Now, later in the cruise, during the day, it was crowded and I bypassed this known “can’t get out” stall and another person was in there and…yep, locked in and couldn’t get out. Obviously another passenger in there had the same thing happen to her before. You hear the faint cries of someone saying “Can someone help me? I’m locked in and can’t get out. Someone please help me”. Another passenger told them “kick the door”. She did…nothing. She kept kicking and kicking and finally the door opened. What I had discovered was that the door handle opens and turns ONLY from the outside and not the inside. When you turned the inside handle the handle moved but not the “guts” to the door therefore not opening.

Other restrooms I witnessed locks missing in them too. These were public restrooms located in hallways on the main floors on the main decks (like 6, 7 & 8). I have never seen such despair on one of NCL’s ships before. This was really taken me and the hubby off guard.

The food I felt was really not up to par compared to our other cruises. I’m not sure why. There was a lot of “runniness” going on this cruise. I had them make me the alfredo sauce in the buffet one night and it was VERY runny/thin/watered down and just not like I’ve had on the other ships. The ranch salad dressing…very runny/thin/watered down as well. The food they had at the buffet was a hit or miss depending on what time you got there I believe. Some things were tasty, others were pretty bland. Not the normal for any of my other NCL cruises either.

Let’s talk about the cups the soda was now served in. All of my previous cruises, you were served in the hard plastic cups, which would vary in size depending on the bar tender or if you ask for a bigger/taller cup. This time…there was nothing but really thin, cheap throw away clear plastic cups. They were VERY small in size and of course they always load it completely full with ice and then give you a shot of soda in it. Guess what? They saw my face and husbands face about three times more this cruise than any normal cruise because 3 sips and it was gone. In my opinion…very wasteful if they are attempting to save money by using throw away cups now versus having to wash cups. It just seemed so cheap. Anyone know if this has went fleet wide? Or just this ship?

The soda cups that are provided by NCL when you have the soda program where changed a little bit (for the good). They use to have lids you had to peel off the top, which sometimes was hard to do. They have now switched them to a screw on type lid. That was a positive move and it was easier to open. Good job NCL. The shape of the cup did not change since our Pearl cruise in March, but there was a different design. (Previous cruises had different designs and types of cups).

Remember the picture I showed of Gatsby’s lounge in the upper level where Ginza is located? Did you look at the buckets all over the floor with the caution tape at the steps? Hmmm, wonder why there was a leak there? It showed up later in the cruise. More a/c leaking or something else? I never heard.

The carpet…throughout the Star. It seemed like every time I turned around, there was either carpet coming up in an area causing a “hump” that I would trip on (or the hubby tripped once too) or a spot in the carpet where it felt like you “sank” down a little in a spot like the floor was weak? We noticed a lot of carpet issues like this all around the ship. Once again, not up to par with the other NCL ships that I’ve sailed. I thought I had read not too long ago someone posting that they read that the Star was for sale. I’m not sure if that is correct but every time we noticed something that just didn’t seem right, my husband said…”it has to be that they are just not keeping the maintenance up on this ship because they plan on getting rid of it”. I don’t know if that’s true or not, but it’s just not the standard for NCL…or at least what I have noticed on any of the others. I was kind of saddened by this.

There were small little things here and there like lights burned out, but I understand things can’t be perfect all the time, especially when a light burns out or something. That’s not exactly a “safety” issue that would harm a cruiser. The carpet and the bathrooms…sorry that’s unacceptable.

Ok, enough of the few "ship" negatives that I wanted to mention for now. On to more “stuff”…(and yes there are more negatives...I will get to them later.) :rolleyes: